A Masquerade of Shadows
by Eirian Erisdar
Summary: Tyki has always been black and white, but when a girl Exorcist comes into his life, everything changes. Allen struggles to cope with his inner self, and the world at war. What will happen to them? Sequel to A Charade of Flames! Romance, humour, mixed in with violence and angst. Tyki x OC. NEW CHRISTMAS SPECIAL CHAPTER UP!
1. Return

**Here's the first chapter of the sequel to a Charade of Flames! At the time of writing, in the manga, Allen is still quietly snoozing away. The aim of this fic is to give my version of what would happen in the final sequence of events leading up to the last battle with the Millennium Earl, and give Tyki and Evelyn a chance to live their lives in full. Therefore, I will deviate from the Manga chapters in the story after this in an AU final ending. I don't own D. Gray-Man or any of its characters, but I own OCs.**

**Moonlight Arrow: Thank you, thank you for reviewing! You made me and my beta very, very happy, and the best thing you can do in a review is to comment on the writer's language. Thanks for appreciating ACOF and being so enthusiastic about AMOS. (Yeah, I'm going to use the abbreviations from now on) **

**And also thanks to Greentreefrog, pizzas are immortal, Cstan, and LittleDarkLady666 for giving me excellent encouragement in writing this chapter.**

Walking through the wastes of her dreams, Evelyn encounters broken and cluttered fragments, memories all, twisting around the melancholy chords of a violin. A small child with a strange lobe on his forehead dances about the feet of Klaud, tracing grey hands through grey air, laughing, _"I'm going to be an exorcist!"_ The words echo, and as the silvery figures dissolve, more painful recollections surface. A blood-soaked white mask by a window. Lavi cries out in pain as he and Bookman disappear into a swirl of dark mist, that curls and reforms–

"_Alma!"_ Kanda yells, Mugen swinging in a circle of whispering death, parting the grey mist about him like the shattered notes of the violin. _"Thank you, Allen Walker,"_ are the murmured words, quickly lost through the white glare of Ark gate, and the fading form of tattered coat and ragged hair. And Allen…Allen leaves.

Then a brighter memory washes over grey, and Evelyn draws some comfort from seeing Tyki, stopping by to drop off intel to Komui, golden eyes ever-bright in the dark mist.

Then amid the swirls of ash and dust, Evelyn sees Tyki as he was a few months ago, tears streaking down his cheeks, blaming himself for not figuring out the Earl's plan to target Kanda and Allen. The violin sings a haunting melody, a prelude to a nightmare. In the no-time of dreams, Evelyn does what she did then; she wordlessly holds Tyki, and Tyki holds her, as their silent tears fall together, finding what comfort they can from each others' presence. Then the nightmare surfaces, and the leering face of the Millennium Earl swarms toward Evelyn, wrenching Tyki from beside her.

Evelyn screams herself awake.

As she pants, heart hammering within her, the soft silvery light of dawn filters in through her window, bringing to life the blackbird in song on her wall, joining the birdsong of the morning. Evelyn closes her eyes momentarily, then growls and stalks off to shower and dress.

She is striding smoothly down the hallways, letting her feet lead her to breakfast, when Reever nearly bowls her over in his excitement. "Evelyn!" he calls over his shoulder as he sprints away. "Lenalee and Marie are back! And _you know who they brought with them?_"

Evelyn stands unnaturally still, the world rotating about her in trails of iridescent light. _Could it be? _ She spins, coat-tails flowing about her in a circle, and whispers, "Acumen. Activate." A shiver runs up her bones, and raw power transforms her black and red gloves into cards, leaving a band of red around each wrist. At her word, they whirl around her, buffeting the lamps on the walls, and she powers up the corridor, sparks dancing around her boots and cards as they undulate, adding to her speed. _I've missed him so much. Not to mention Master–_

In the warm sunlight of the Order entrance, a tall young man with hair the shade of darkened cobalt, a rough scarf wrapped around his neck, and traveler's clothes of trench coat and rough boots is silhouetted, bordered by white flames.

Kanda Yu stares dispassionately at his surroundings, letting his eyes wander about the dull stone ceiling. Then he looks down and comes face to face with a pair of sparkling violet eyes.

The next moment, the breath is knocked out of him as Evelyn throws her arms around him, Acumen and her coat flapping about them in the wind of her passing. Kanda stares down at her, and slowly grins, returning her hug.

"I'm back," he murmurs softly. Behind him, Marie and Lenalee look on, dumbstruck.

"Welcome home," Evelyn chokes, then steps back and examines him with a glimmer in her gaze.

Kanda winces. "Ah, yes about Master– ARGH!"

"You deserve this," Evelyn says imperiously, sniffing. "Master cried for weeks."

Kanda's voice is slightly muffled by the fact his face is squashed to the floor by Evelyn's boot. "Evie…" he says, sounding genuinely apologetic despite that she cannot hear him clearly. "I'm sorry. I really am. Can I get up now?"

Evelyn snorts, and releases him. "I'm getting Master Teddy." Without another word, she speeds off again, raising a small cloud of dust around the crouched form of Kanda.

Marie's laughter forces the Kanda's eyebrows into a sharp frown. But Lenalee notices with no little glee that he turns away to hide a smile.

(:~:)

Tiedoll picks at his breakfast moodily, turning his scrambled egg into a mush. He sighs again, and rubs his face tiredly. The Cafeteria is nearly empty by now, most science department members already back at their workstations. Recent events weigh heavily on Tiedoll's mind, and the food turns to ash in his mouth.

A gentle hand touches his arm. "Master Teddy," a soft voice admonishes.

Tiedoll spares Evelyn a half-grin, his heart warmed as ever by Evelyn's musical words. "Evelyn," he replies, noting with some surprise the barely restrained twitching at the corners of her mouth. "You seem…excited about something," he comments, wondering what it could be. He hasn't seen her happy in quite a while, rather, cold and sorrowful, like a winter held in frost.

Evelyn slides into the bench beside Tiedoll, and simply looks at him.

The fork slips out of his hand to _clatter_ against his plate, and his eyes light up with renewed hope. "Is he…is he…" he gasps, tears leaking out of the corners of his eyes.

Evelyn gives a slow nod, and a smile blossoms over her features like spring washing away the bitter bite of winter. Tiedoll nearly trips over the bench as he vaults over the table and stumbles out of the cafeteria.

A crystalline laugh explodes out of Evelyn, and she and pours herself a cup of tea from the teapot at the centre of the table, her thoughts light and free. Suddenly, she becomes aware of the growling in her stomach, and reaches for the round cover of the dish in front of her. Her scream rends the air, and Jerry leaps out from behind the kitchen, only to give an even higher-pitched shriek.

Evelyn stares at Tyki's grinning head, sticking out of the silver surface of the empty plate, surrounded by faint hexagons. "Don't _do_ that!" she yells at him.

"What?" Tyki asks innocently, rising up through the table and jumping down with an easy motion, the landing ruffling his crumpled hair and his white shirt. As he settles on the bench beside Evelyn, one laughing gold eye winks at Jerry and he calls, "Could I get a coffee? Black, please."

Jerry gets over his hyperventilating by reaching for the coffee.

Tyki turns back to Evelyn, and grunts as she stomps on his foot. He shakes the boot absentmindedly, saying apologetically, "Ah, yes. Sorry about just now."

Evelyn glares at him. "Oh, so you're _sorry,_ then?" she says scathingly.

Tyki nods, tilts his head at her, and blinks as she flicks him on the nose, leaving it feeling inflamed. He screws his eyes shut, rubs his nose, and his cheeks flare with heat as he feels Evelyn kiss him quickly on the cheek and take his hand.

"Um," he stammers, as Jerry shuffles over and deposits a pot of coffee by his elbow. "Thanks!" Tyki calls after him, and turns back to Evelyn. "Uh…" he murmurs, his mind blissfully blank.

Evelyn rolls her eyes and stares at him coolly, reaching over with her free hand for a bit of toast. "Well?" she asks expectantly, raising an eyebrow.

Tyki deflates, his cheeks returning to their normal shade. "Alright," he sighs, facing her. Evelyn puts down her toast, and watches him seriously. She knows him too well to make the mistake of taking whatever this is lightly. Tyki closes his eyes for a moment, then he quietly says, "I thought something must have been going on at the Black Ark, because Sheril's been…slightly unhinged since Road disappeared."

"What did you find?" Evelyn whispers. _I know Road has been gone for quite a while now, but what could Sheril have done?_

"Sheril's imprisoned Lavi and Bookman," Tyki breathes, the words pouring out of him. "He's been keeping this from me, while interrogating them about a new weapon of some sort. A weapon of _Understanding_, I think he called it."

Evelyn forces her fear for her friends down, and asks, "How are they?"

"Alive," Tyki murmurs, looking away.

"But not well," Evelyn says sorrowfully. Sighing, she reaches up and turns Tyki's jaw back towards her. "But at the moment, the most pressing matter is that of _your_ position." Violet eyes meet gold. "Does the Earl suspect?"

"No," Tyki shakes his head. "At least, I don't think so."

"Good. Is there any way to get Lavi and Bookman out?"

"I visited them in secret. Bookman warned me not to do anything, lest my position be revealed." Tyki gives a bitter laugh. "I'm too _valuable_ a source of intelligence, apparently."

Evelyn pulls him into a hug and murmurs comfortingly, "It's not your fault." She hears him breathe in, then out, slowly.

"I've located Allen Walker," Tyki whispers softly next to her ear.

"What?" Evelyn pulls back and stares at him, hope glimmering in her eyes, her hands on his shoulders.

"I want to know _what_, too." The clear voice breaks over them.

Evelyn and Tyki's heads snap toward the door, where Tiedoll raises his eyebrows at them, Kanda in half-shadow behind him. Kanda looks like he wants to hack up a hairball, a deadly look in his dark eyes as he watches the couple.

"Tyki's found Allen!" Evelyn whispers happily.

The change in Kanda's expression is barely noticeable, but it's there, a maelstrom of bitterness, confusion, and strangely, relief. It flits across his face in an instantaneous shadow. Tiedoll, for his part, jumps across the room with a shout of joy and swings Evelyn around in a bear hug.

Kanda and Tyki stare at each other with the nonchalance of men who might kill each other at the slightest aggravation. Then Kanda says, "Tch," and moves into the light of the cafeteria, and Evelyn gapes at the red-hilted katana in its crimson sheath poking over his shoulder.

"You crystal-typed?" Evelyn exclaims, bounding over.

"What does it look like?" Kanda replies emotionlessly. He turns to Tiedoll. "I'm going after Allen."

Tyki raises his eyebrows at Kanda's back and looks questioningly at Evelyn. She shrugs and shakes her head. Sighing, Tyki says clearly, "If you're going to search for him, I'll have to drop in every now and then to provide you with new intel."

Kanda whirls and snarls at him, "Forget it."

Tyki fluidly rises and lithely strides over to Kanda. "You going toe-to-toe with me, pretty boy?" he says, dangerously calm.

"What did you just call me, curly-haired Noah?" Kanda murmurs, his right hand creeping up toward Mugen.

The next moment, a gloved hand smushes into either face and throws them apart, accompanied with Evelyn's angered shout, "_Boys!_"

Kanda and Tyki collapse, groaning, into opposite benches, clutching their heads. When their watering eyes open wide enough, Evelyn stalks between them and whispers in a terrifying voice, "I'm coming with you, Kanda. Tyki, you'll contact _me_ with intel." She glares at them, violet eyes holding insurmountable danger.

Two voices squeak in unison, "OK."

Evelyn's deathly grin spreads. "Good."

Tiedoll laughs so hard he collapses to the floor.

(:~:)

Reever takes another sip of his lemon soda and focuses once more on the chart of figures on the desk before him. A pounding headache only exacerbates his fatigue. Then a high-pitched shout by his ear sends his blonde hair sticking up like spikes.

"What is it again, Johnny?" Reever says tiredly, swiveling to his right.

"MY GRANDMOTHER IS SICK!" Johnny wails, tearing at his curly hair, rocking on his knees before Reever. "I NEED TO GO HOME AND TAKE CARE OF HER!"

Reever suppresses the urge to kick Johnny in the head and simply repeats, like he has dozens of times, "Not that excuse again." One hand rubs his face.

"It's true!" Johnny snivels. "It's a family matter–"

This time Reever lightly pushes Johnny over with is shoe and yells, "I know what you want to do. Believe me, that's what I want to do! But searching for Allen is nigh on impossible!"

Tiedoll's voice resounds from behind Reever's shoulder. "Actually, it isn't at all impossible."

"General!" Reever exclaims, turning. "Ah…I thought no one else was in here…"

"It's quite all right." Tiedoll gives a crazily happy grin.

Johnny shuffles over to Tiedoll and slowly stands, sniffling. "You said…something about finding Allen?" Hope unlooked-for lightens his eyes behind his thick glasses.

Tiedoll sighs and quietly explains Evelyn and Kanda's plan.

Johnny nearly squeals with delight and yells, "Then I can go with them!"

Reever forces him into a chair, stares him in the eye, and says seriously, "If you go with them, you will be breaching your orders. They are Exorcists. They can act as if they are on a mission. _You_ can't."

"But…but…" Johnny wails.

Tiedoll pats his shoulder. "Leave it to them. Allen is their friend as much as he is yours." His kindly eyes glimmer.

Johnny is silent for a long while. So long, in fact, Reever starts to think something is wrong, _silent_ not being a word he usually connects with Johnny. Then Johnny straightens, blinks back tears, and says bravely, "Well, I'll have to redesign Mikky to only communicate with us, and not the Order then."

"Good man," Tiedoll says.

(:~:)

Evelyn kicks at the grass by her feet and leans against the cliff wall, the hood of a green cloak shadowing her face, cinched at the collar with her silver chain. The sheer rock face stretches up to the arch of blue like a roadway to the heavens. Just around the corner is Headquarters' entrance, but Evelyn's position is hidden. Next to her are two bundles; one, her personal bag, and the second, a little food and money.

A short while later, Kanda emerges from the undergrowth and adjusts the straps on his pack. A cream-coloured trench coat hides his uniform as effectively as Evelyn's cloak hides hers.

"Let's go," Evelyn says.

"Are you sure you can wear that openly?" Kanda asks suddenly, pointing at where her cloak is fastened by her chain. The pendant of poker chip and cards flashes in the bright morning sunlight.

"Yes," Evelyn replies shortly, and turns. Mikky follows her, wings beating frantically.

Kanda overtakes her. "Let us be off. If Leverrier finds out about this, we're good as dead," he says emotionlessly.

"So optimistic," Evelyn murmurs under her breath.

(:~:)

For the fifth time that afternoon, Evelyn backhands another drunk guy in the face and listens as he thuds to the floor, alcohol fumes issuing from his mouth. Kanda grunts from the bar beside her, nursing a glass of something golden.

"I don't see how the curly-haired idiot couldn't have given us Allen's exact co-ordinates," Kanda snarls, glaring around the pub. Half the guys in the smoky room have already fallen over into their own sick, and the slightly less tipsy keep a curious eye trained on the Kanda and Evelyn, perched on stools by the bar.

"Well, Allen's quite good at hiding, and I'd rather not jump him," Evelyn murmurs back, then chokes on a sip of apple cider as a slurred voice blurs the air by her ear. "You…you're beau…pretty…like…like the shparkly…shtars…"

Kanda's gloved fist darts across her vision and slams Drunkie in the face. Sloshed with pain and spirits, Drunkie crumples into the heap of unconscious guys slowly piling up next to them. "This can't go on," Kanda groans as he watches Drunkie twitch. "You're attracting too much attention."

Evelyn grins as she eyes something over his shoulder. "I don't think that's _my_ problem anymore, pretty boy."

Kanda's lip curls in disgust as he looks around.

"_Hey pr…pretty girl…"_ the seriously slushed man dribbles, reaching a grime-covered hand for Kanda's hair. "_Can I buy you a dr-drink? S'll be–_"

CRUNCH.

Kanda empties the rest of his tankard of ale, with which he had smashed into the face of the filthy man, over the man's insensible features. Then he turns to Evelyn and narrows his eyes at her silent chuckles.

"Let's go," Kanda growls, and slams some money on the bar.

Evelyn follows Kanda out into the late afternoon sunlight, musing over their next steps. "Is there any way to help Lavi and Bookman?" she wonders aloud, glancing around the square.

"Not likely," Kanda says dispassionately as they push through a particularly thick crowd surrounding a fat, dancing performer of some sort. "The force needed to break into the Black Ark in the first place…" he suddenly lowers himself onto the marble base of a statue and rubs his temples. "Stupid headache..."

"Are you actually _drunk?_" Evelyn chortles, bending over to examine him more closely. "The great Kanda Yu can't hold his drink?"

Kanda squeezes his eyes shut and snarls, "Evie. Shut–" His head turns suddenly to his right, and he trails off, watching the street performer.

"What's wro…" Evelyn feels the words die on her lips as she, too, beholds the clown. In a trance, she slides between the crowds, towards the twirling figure. In her mind, she strips away the gaudy collar, top hat and poofy costume over wiry form, the crazy hula-hoops and baubles, the buttons and the white facial makeup covering a barely concealed scar…

Evelyn sees Allen Walker.

"Kanda…" Evelyn chokes, and dry-swallows. "I think that's…" she glances to her left, and chills break out across her brow.

Kanda glares at the clown, one hand fingering the hilt of cloth-wrapped Mugen, beast-eyes nearly afire with cerulean hate. "That clown…something makes me want to _slice him up._"

"What?" Evelyn squeaks.

"Just…let me slice him up a little bit…" Kanda breathes, striding purposefully forward. "I'm really, really pissed off by this guy…" Mugen is already half-drawn from its sheath, silver edge grinning wickedly. As Evelyn extends a hand to delay Kanda, a sudden pulse of air flattens them both, and screams erupt around them. Evelyn watches in horror as a black pool spreads in inky waves below the clown. An Akuma mouth, horribly gaping, rises up out of it and _swallows the clown_.

Mugen dances out of its sheath even as Acumen activates, wreathing Evelyn's hands in amethyst flame. As they dart toward the Akuma, a shudder runs through the metallic form of the demon, and it _ruptures_ in a shower of black matter and crackling. Out of the ashes of the Akuma, a white shadow rises, feathered edges surrounding an exquisite silver-filigreed mask.

Kanda and Evelyn skid to a halt by the wavering form, Mugen sparkling with hidden emotion and Acumen drawing a circle in the dust. The figure in white shifts, and reveals a small child clutched to his chest. As he slides effortlessly down the fallen Akuma's sides to the cobbles, the perfect mask slips off his face, and Kanda's eyes widen.

"Woyashi?" he breathes, a strange, ambivalent emotion edging his words.

(:~:)

Tyki leans against the statue at the top of the pillar, balancing precariously on the ledge, the wind catching the pure white tails of his coat. Wisely crouches next to him, a scarf wrapped around his head. Tyki had tried to come himself, but the Earl had somehow found out and decided Wisely should accompany him. He is _not_ impressed with his nephew.

Wisely scratches his ear and glances at Evelyn. "So that's who the Earl was talking about."

"What?" Tyki snaps, more sharply than he had intended.

"Didn't you know?" Wisely says luxuriously, stretching. "That girl has the Innocence of _understanding_. Are you really as thick as you look?"

Tyki growls at him and struggles to keep his face blank in the light of this revelation. "What does he intend to do with her?" he asks carefully.

Wisely shrugs. "Wait 'till the opportune moment to capture her, then torture 'till she offers to serve, blah blah blah." He glances up at Tyki, and says strangely, "Don't you know the routine?"

"Interesting black and white, as always," Tyki laughs uneasily. He looks back down at the three exorcists. "Scout the perimeter of the town for more exorcists, will you?" he says. "Return to the Ark after you're done."

"What about you?" Wisely asks.

"I want to see how our brother the Fourteenth deals with this. I'll tell you all the details later," Tyki replies quietly.

Wisely nods, then is gone.

Tyki closes his eyes and tries to think of a plan. His mind stays hopelessly blank.

(:~:)

"Allen!" Evelyn yells, leaping forward, but stops hesitantly as Allen lowers the child to the ground.

"I've shown you a terrible performance," Allen says softly to the little girl. "I'm sorry. Be careful on your way home." His white-gloved right hand gently brushes away the tears on the girl's cheeks. She suddenly leaps forward and hugs Allen's neck tightly, then turns and darts away through the crowd.

Allen's gaze follows her fondly, then he turns toward Evelyn and Kanda. "Allen?" Evelyn asks.

Allen turns and makes a bolt for it.

Rolling her eyes, Evelyn sweeps Acumen in a sizzling arc of flame and snagging it around the ankle of Allen's clown boot, jerking him back with a painful _crunch_ to the cobbles before her. Typically, he stumbles to his feet again and stubbornly begins to stagger away. Kanda simply steps forward and sweeps out his foot from under him, even as Acumen tightens around his other ankle and leaves Allen without any balance whatsoever. His Innocence deactivates as the back of his head smashes into the ground.

Allen gives a tortured gasp as he stares up at them, eyes glazed, wearing a stupid-looking baggy clown costume.

Kanda places a hand at Allen's collar, keeping his weight on him, and murmurs, "Ah. I understand now. I thought you were so irritating because it was _you_."

"Don't be so violent, Kanda," Evelyn admonishes, but can't help a huge smile from spreading.

"Woyashi?" Kanda asks. Allen sulks quietly, unresponding. Kanda says his usual "Tch," and motions at Evelyn. "Give me something to rub with." Evelyn mutely hands him a handkerchief. Kanda's face splits in a satisfied smile as he raises the cloth. Allen screws his eyes shut in preparation.

"OW IT HURTS IT HURTS IT HURTS IT HURTS!"

Kanda fluidly blocks the kick to his head as Allen yells, "ARE YOU TRYING TO PEEL THE SKIN OFF MY FACE, BAKANDA?" His scar is now easily visible, purple against the pink of his raw skin.

"Woyashi," Kanda gives a half-grin.

"IT'S ALLEN!" Allen and Evelyn shout in unison.

"So. You haven't turned into the Fourteenth yet." It is a statement, not a question.

Allen's face darkens with shame. "How did you find me?" he asks quickly.

"Curly-hair," Kanda says with vehemence. "But let me ask a question. How did that Crow, Howard Link, die?"

Allen goes still. "Howard…died?" he whispers, shock wiping his face clean of all but innocent sorrow. Then a sudden shudder runs through him, and his left eye whirrs to life. "The Fourteenth..." he gasps.

A shivering second of silence.

Then the world explodes around them as another Akuma, mouth agape most horribly, lunges out from below Allen. Allen's sword leaps into existence as his white cloak dances about him. "What, are you crazy?" Evelyn laughs at the Akuma, using Acumen to spring into the air. " You chose to appear when _three _Exorcistswere above you?"

The Akuma howls as it is skewered by Allen's sword, Mugen, and Acumen. Then Allen shivers, and looks at the ground, where dozens more Akuma gates swirl and reform like pools of ink. Allen presses a hand to his forehead, then crown belt towers above them, pushing Allen up to a roof where he turns tail and flees, yelling, "Tim! Take me to the most isolated place you can!"

Evelyn feels a presence by her side, and turns to see Tyki, immaculate in a full-length white coat. He turns to her, eyes dark. "Follow me," he murmurs, grabs her hand, and slips into the alleyways of the town. His hand is strong and warm over hers, and she clutches it gratefully as the maze of alleys whirl and spin around her. Kanda's light steps follow them. Tyki does not speak further, and weaves his way through the town with a sparkling intensity in his golden eyes.

Finally, they reach a bridge spanning a dry canal, and in the soft blankets of shadow under the arch lies a crumpled form with a golden golem fluttering about its head.

Tyki skids down the banks of the canal effortlessly, an arm circling Evelyn's waist to aid her balance. Kanda snorts as he follows. As they reach the small figure, Allen raises his head and groans, "Neah, do you hate me?"

Evelyn starts as she sees the light grey tone of his skin. "Allen…" she breathes.

Tyki lets go of her hand and crouches by Allen, grabbing his collar to get him to a sitting position. "You're fine," he says quietly. Allen nearly sobs with pain, and Tyki is startled by the unbridled desperation in his eyes. "You feel the Noah?" Tyki asks quietly.

Allen nods, too much in agony to speak.

"What do you have in life to cling on to?" Tyki whispers. "Fold them around the Noah and _bind_ it."

"Nakama," Allen chokes through rapid breaths.

"For me, it was Evelyn," Tyki murmurs, sparing her a glance. "Allow your friends to protect you by defending your mind."

Allen's breathing comes easier, but his skin is still tinged grey.

On the canal behind, an Akuma erupts out of a gate with an earsplitting crack. Mugen finds it noiselessly. Kanda doesn't even spare it a look.

Allen raises his gaze to Kanda, and asks, "Why are you here? I was really happy that you're alive, but weren't you going to stay with Alma?" His voice raises in horror. "Any why are you in the Order's uniform? Why are you throwing away your _freedom_?"

Kanda stutters forward with a spasm-like motion, grabbing Allen's collar and slamming him against the bricks. Tyki watches curiously. Kanda glares at Allen, wild hurt dancing in his dark eyes. "Because," Kanda begins, as if every word causes him pain, "I swore not to tell anyone until I die…Alma's last moments was mine, and mine alone." His eyes narrow. "You gave this to us, so we are free."

Allen stares at Kanda for a moment, then begins to sob. Kanda drops him unceremoniously like a sack of potatoes and steps back. He rolls his eyes when he sees Evelyn's red-rimmed eyes, and looks at Tyki.

Tyki raises his hands. "I'm not crying for you, mate," he says quickly, eyes wide in mock-horror.

Allen faints mid-sob.

Tyki, Kanda and Evelyn stare down at him.

"Well, _that_ was easy," Tyki mutters.

"Tch."

(:~:)

Allen slumbers quietly, tucked up warmly between the sheets. Tyki, Evelyn and Kanda sit on the sofa opposite, watching him. Allen gives a little whiffle. The hotel manager hadn't objected to how odd the three of them looked, carrying an unconscious boy between them, when Tyki had slammed a bagful of gold on the receptionist's desk.

Kanda snorts. "Want me to yell at him again?"

"Kanda…" Evelyn warns, glaring at him.

Eventually, tired from waiting, Evelyn falls asleep on Tyki's shoulder, Tyki staying absolutely still. In the silence, the tension builds. Finally, Kanda whispers spitefully to Tyki, "Why are _you_ still here, anyway?"

Tyki shifts slightly to rearrange Evelyn's head from his shoulder, and looks at Kanda pointedly, motioning at Evelyn. Kanda stands up and mutters, "I'm going to scout the perimeter."

"I'm coming with you," Tyki murmurs, and gently lowers Evelyn so she is lying on the sofa. At Kanda's questioning scowl, he shrugs and says easily, "What? I'm bored."

If Evelyn hadn't been asleep, Kanda would have unsheathed Mugen by now.

They leave the hotel together, Tyki grinning at Kanda's discomfort.

(:~:)

A blonde-haired man with long braided hair moves like a wraith in the shadows, his steps silent, coat masking his handsome face. The shadows climb up the wall, but somehow he knows the rhythms of the night and the soundless voice of the walls. He prides himself in his skills of stealth, of being able to move without anyone noticing –

Not tonight.

Howard Link's face makes a horrible _crunching_ noise as it is slammed into the wall.

A surprised, yet smooth voice intones, "The Crow?" the pressure lessens on the chokehold against his neck.

Link rubs his nose dejectedly as he spins, knife appearing in his hand. Tyki simply stares at him, and says wonderingly, "How did you possibly survive? When the Earl pulled me back through the portal, you had feathers sticking out of your eyes." The moonlight reflects off his white clothes, blaringly advertising power. Tyki Mikk has no reason to hide, being incredibly powerful.

"Nice to see you, too," Link replies drily. Something sharp rests on the back of his neck, singing hollowly. Keeping his eyes forward, he says emotionlessly, "Kanda Yu. I thought I'd never see you again. I'm glad to see you've come back."

"Shut up," Kanda snaps. "That sounded weird."

Tyki tries not to laugh, and is not entirely successful. As the little chuckles overwhelm him, Kanda glares (he's been doing a lot of that) and Link turns slowly. "You look healthy," Kanda mentions as he tilts his head at Link.

"I'm surprised you would worry about me," Link says, sarcastically grateful.

"I don't," Kanda snarls.

Tyki straightens, wipes away a stray tear of mirth, and waves his hands at them self-importantly. "One of you should propose to the other," he chokes, and doubles over in laughter again.

Link, supremely indifferent, answers Kanda's unspoken question. "I'm alive because I ran away. They…don't like Crow who fail in their missions."

"You here to kill beansprout?" Kanda asks dispassionately. "I'll be the one to kill him." This sobers Tyki up immediately.

"Nope," Link says, smiling brightly. Then he says with previously unseen sincerity, "If the boy can fight against the monster within him, I want to be the one to see it, and find the source of power that gives him that will to survive."

Tyki grins, and claps a hand on Link's shoulder. Link twitches. "Now, then!" Tyki smiles dazzlingly, "Since the both of you now have had your nice little reunion, we can go back to the hotel, right? Evelyn's looking after Allen."

Link is silent for a moment, then turns and tilts his head at Tyki. Letting his words fall with the weight of hammer strikes, he comments disbelievingly, "You left your _girlfriend_ alone in an unknown city, with only an unconscious, unstable budding Noah for protection?"

Tyki blinks once, then speeds off, not bothering with streets but running straight through the walls and houses.

Link chuckles and looks at Kanda. "Stop being such a sourpuss," he laughs.

"SHUT UP!"

(:~:)

Tyki nearly bursts into the room, and sighs with relief as he finds everything as they left it. After a while, Kanda and Link appear, and Kanda says flippantly, "Well, did you have your little heart attack?"

"At least they're safe."

"Why don't you two kill each other?" Link offers, dumping his bags in a corner.

Tyki smirks. "Pretty boy."

"Inhuman."

"Do you even care for Evelyn at all?" Tyki asks quietly.

"Oh, but I forgot, I cannot compare to your _love_ for Evie, can I?" Kanda returns. "You know why I hate you?"

"Why?" Tyki yells.

Kanda yells back, even more loudly, "Because I love her more than anything, but she will never love me the way she loves you." Tyki's mouth drops open.

A soft voice intercedes. "I thought you had gotten over it."

Kanda and Tyki swivel to the sofa, where Evelyn rubs her eyes tiredly and frowns at them. "As much as it's sort of nice to have two boys arguing over me," Evelyn says in a dangerously low voice, "I would much rather you guys heard my opinion." She turns to Link. "Oh, and hi. Nice to see you alive."

Link bows deeply to her. "Pleased to be back, Miss Merle. You're as beautiful as ever."

Kanda and Tyki glare at him together. Perhaps they would have come to blows, if Allen had not chosen that moment to murmur sleepily, "Wuzzgoinon?"

"Allen!" Evelyn says joyfully.

Allen blinks, and groans. "Link! So glad to see you! Why did you come back now, of all times?"

Link bustles over to shake his hand, and says airily, "Well, I wanted to be there to see you recover. Besides, we're going to raid the Black Ark to get Lavi and Bookman."

"What?" Allen, Tyki, Evelyn and Kanda exclaim in unison.

Link rolls his eyes. "Leverrier knows everything. Wasn't that always going to be your next step after finding Allen?"

"I like _him_. He's smart," Evelyn comments, and smiles at the other two men's growls.

**Opinions? Please tell me what you think about where this is going. I want to write some serious angst for once (though I think I can't write anything without inserting humour) Thanks for reading :)**


	2. Incarceration

**Second chapter! (On a completely random note, AVENGERS WAS GREAT!) Ahem. All Lavi fans out there, you'll love this. Humour and angst and mystery is an nice combination. I don't own D. Gray-Man or any of its characters, only OCs.**

**GreentreeFrog: Your review is wonderful (and why are you saying sorry? There's absolutely nothing to be sorry for!). Thank you for liking Evelyn. I've always thought that if a person didn't have flaws, it wouldn't be realistic. And I'm feeling extremely flattered that you think I write Tyki well. I'm quite embarrassed, actually. But that made me glow inside, so thank you so much.**

**MoonlightArrow: Thank you for your enthusiasm. I suck at conveying gratitude through words, so I'm just going to give you a virtual hug. And your sensor for conflicts is spot on. You'll love this chapter, because conflict is pretty much what's going to happen.**

**meemertree: Hey, thanks for liking the humour! You must have spent all the time between reviewing reading through A Charade of Flames before you got here, given the time between the two reviews. Thank you for spending your time doing this.**

**.Sisters, TheParadoxicalOtaku, Icebabe7723, Inkroze, darknessqueen101, Jaxx Ren, pizzas are immortal, Osanai Yume: Thank you for staying with this story! Hope you like this chapter.**

**lotusmelody17, Kagome Ichizen Fan, LittleDarkLady666: Thank you for noticing this story, and hope you like it.**

In the flickering half-light

of wandering flames,

Despair curls, chained,

crimson scarf dripping

crimson blood.

Far from mortal sight

in green eye blinking

Memories swirl

of Nakamas' names;

but in incarceration

Darkness floods.

(:~:)

In a shabbily built hotel somewhere in a town of no importance, Link hurls himself out the room door and slams it shut behind him, leaning his body weight against it. He feels as if his ears have had splinters driven into them. As Link struggles to get his breathing under control, Kanda smirks from where he leans against the wall opposite, runs a hand through his meticulate blue hair, and says airily, "I told you it would be explosive, didn't I?"

"It isn't explosive. It's war," Link murmurs, and he winces as he checks his ears for blood, still listening to the shouts issuing from the room behind him.

"I'M COMING WITH YOU!" Evelyn yells, violet eyes flashing in fury.

"You're not," Tyki says impassively, tucking another few items into a bag, his back to her. "You're taking care of Allen here." His perfect white coat, high collared, long-sleeved and silky, swings around as he paces across the room.

Allen watches the scene with wide eyes, bedcovers held up to his nose, silver hair sticking up messily. He shrinks until he is but a little form covered in white sheets.

"I'm not about to sit here and babysit while you three go off and storm the Black Ark!" Evelyn exclaims, stalking in front of Tyki.

Allen sticks his head out of the swirl of bedclothes and interjects, "Hey, I'm not a baby–"

"SHUT UP!" Tyki and Evelyn shout at him. Startled, Allen recedes until only his bleached hair is visible again. Evelyn and Tyki face each other, Evelyn with her hands on her hips, Tyki with his hair even more unruly than usual, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

"For the last time, the answer's _no_," Tyki says shortly, and turns away. As he does, he hears a sniffle from behind, and closes his eyes. When he swivels back, Evelyn raises tear-filled eyes to meet his defiantly. Her hands are shaking.

"Evelyn…" Tyki whispers brokenly. "Don't…do that…" he runs his hand through his hair, then lets it drop. "When you do that, it makes me…" He reaches for her shoulder, but she pulls away, wiping her eyes with her glove. Tyki stands there, silent.

"Why wo…won't you…let me…come with you?" Evelyn sobs, burying her face in her hands. "You promised we would never stay apart, not when we could be together." She blindly reaches for his hand and then throws her arms around him.

Tyki sighs, and feels his heartstrings tear, even as he holds her. Slowly, he begins to answer. "Because…because you're the Earl's secret weapon." His hand strokes her hair gently.

"What?" Evelyn breathes, snapping up her head. Allen peeks out from the bed, then stuffs himself back under again.

"He's looking for the Innocence of Understanding, Evelyn," Tyki murmurs, brushing away her tears with his thumb. "He wants you to work for him." His liquid gold eyes are brimming with tortured fear, fear for _her_, Evelyn realises.

Evelyn chokes into his shirt, "I would never–"

"I know you wouldn't," Tyki says quietly, smiling bitterly down at her. "But if he were to capture you…" he swallows painfully, and whispers, "Just stay here and be safe."

"Alright," Evelyn replies softly. She hugs him tighter.

Tyki sneaks a glance at Allen to find him with eyes screwed shut and fingers in his ears. Grinning, Tyki leans down and gives Evelyn a quick kiss, before breaking their embrace. Holding on to her hand, he strides over to the door and opens it. "All clear," he says humourously.

Link stretches and raises an eyebrow. "I thought you two would kill each other," he groans.

Kanda moves around the three of them to pack his own bag, scowling shortly. "Let's go. We're wasting time as it is."

"Remember, Evelyn," Tyki says, "we will enter the Black Ark at the end of the alley beside the hotel. Be wary of anything that comes out."

After they had contacted Johnny and Reever (leaving out the bit about invading the Ark) it is finally time to go. As Kanda and Link hoist up their equipment packs lightly, and Tyki slings a simple shoulder bag across his front, Allen asks, "What am I going to do?"

"You stay here, Woyashi," Kanda mutters. "Evelyn will babysit."

"The name's Allen!"

"Tch." Kanda strides smartly out the door, sparing a lingering look at Evelyn. Link bows elegantly at Evelyn and follows. Tyki kisses Evelyn goodbye and melds through the wall. Evelyn simply stares after them, a look of melancholic wistfulness on her features.

Allen chooses this moment to sigh, "I don't exist, right? Not a single farewell. Whatever, I'm hungry."

Darker thoughts trickle through Evelyn's mind, but she forces them down. "Well," she says brightly to Allen, "I make great scrambled eggs. Breakfast?" She begins to bustle around the small cooking unit, sending the coals ablaze with a spurt of flame from Acumen. "And miturashi dango…?"

Allen's face lights up. "OH YES!"

(:~:)

The early morning sun tries, but fails, to shed light into the narrow crack between the buildings. As Link, Kanda and Tyki silently slip down the dank, salty-smelling darkness of the alley, Tyki says easily, "Link. Does Leverrier know of our mission?" His eyes glow luminous gold in the damp gloom, above the blurred white of his coat.

Link stops so suddenly, Kanda curses as he walks into Link's pack. After a moment, Link continues walking. "No, he doesn't know about this. I said Leverrier knows I'm alive because by the time we got back to the hotel, I knew I didn't have either of you fooled," he says, words fading into the shadows of the alley.

"Did you think we were stupid?" Kanda snorts.

"I didn't say it, you did," Link murmurs, and is rewarded with a sharp shove from behind him. At the end of the dark passage, a solid brick wall, curtained with slime, thick and heavy. Grey and black and disgusting green, yet gently shimmering.

Tyki moves to the front of the group examines the wall closely. "Right," he says self-importantly, straightening. "Hold on to me so I can walk you through the gate's dimensions."

"I'm not holding your hand," Link says firmly. Kanda, for once, seems to agree with him.

Tyki rolls his eyes at the two of them, reaches around their heads to grab their respective ponytails, and _drags_ them back-to-front through the wall, ignoring their indignant exclamations. At the other side, he releases his grip and fluidly sways away from the two hook punches directed at his face, grinning all the while.

Kanda and Link stop trying to hit Tyki when they see their surroundings.

Lavishly furnished, the main hallway of the Black Ark is lit with dozens of candles flickering to their stubs, giving the oak floor a glowing shine. But somehow the shadows seem sharper, the sable corners darker. The dark edges of the corridor are of a black that is not only the _absence_ of light, but also a void, a hopeless emptiness.

Kanda and Link stare at this.

"Cheery," Link comments.

Tyki claps both of them on the shoulder just to annoy them and begins to stride away, muttering away at a inhuman speed, "Be careful, my brothers and sisters could be anywhere. Bookman and Lavi are in a room some distance away. If you see anyone, hide. And whatever you do, do not wander off on your own. The streets of this Ark are dark, shrouded by mist and gnawed by horrors. The creatures leave us alone, as we are their masters, but to them, you are fair game."

"I can deal with it," Kanda says shortly. "I am not some child who needs comforting."

"No, you can't," Link murmurs, staring straight ahead. "I've heard…stories growing up about the creatures of the Ark. They are…not of this world, and they can move faster than you can blink. We should be wary." He almost shivers.

The small group moves silently over the wooden floorboards, disturbing nothing around them in their passing. But suddenly, a voice a-drip with sugary sweetness issues around a turn in the corridor. "Oh, Sheril," the Millennium Earl oozes, "Don't worry. Road will be found in time."

Tyki, Kanda and Link freeze, their bizarre poses reflected in a mirror set in the wall next to them. Link stares at Tyki, wide-eyed.

"Oh, crap," Tyki squeaks, and pulls open a bejeweled door to their left, hurrying the other two into the spacious study behind. Kanda and Link scramble in, and Tyki closes the door with an oiled _click_. Then he composes himself and turns, letting just enough grey wash over his skin in order to keep his Noah under control.

The Earl rounds the corner and positively beams, "_Tyki-pet!_ I was looking for you. I need to speak to you and Sheril here." He simpers happily while Sheril smirks at Tyki's expression.

Tyki says flippantly to Sheril, "Hey, Brother." He hopes his voice sounds as casually relaxed as it usually does.

Sheril dips his chin at Tyki. "Tyki. Always the dandy, aren't you?" he grins, glancing at his brother's perfect full-length white coat, high collar framing his elegant chin. "No wonder all the ladies in court are falling for you." A malicious glint enters his eyes. "We'll have to marry you off soon."

"Shut up, Sheril. I'd rather die first," Tyki snaps.

"Someone special already on your mind?" Sheril teases, oiled voice gently insulting, but mysteriously knowing. Tyki's heart takes a suicidal dive for his toes.

"Sheril, Tyki-pet," the Earl coos, "Don't bicker anymore. We have to talk in private. Now, where – Ah! This study is perfect." To Tyki's horror, the Earl extends one pudgy, gloved hand towards the lavish doorway to their left, and swings open the door with a flourish.

The study is a elegant, tasteful ensemble of mahogany and bronze, Indian carpets covering wood floors, expensive pictures lining the dark oak walls, and flickering firelight from a massive fireplace. Two sofas and an armchair in an inverted U, stuffed with feathers. And in a corner, a rather _large_ closet for hanging coats, just spacious enough for two six-foot tall men bristling with weapons…

Forcing a smile onto his face, Tyki vaults into the sofa, landing in a tangle of long limbs, and Sheril slouches over to sit on the sofa opposite. The Earl destroys the armchair by sagging his enormous weight into it, causing it to creak dangerously.

"Now," the Earl chuckles, "I'm going to tell you about the _Innocence of Understanding_."

Tyki struggles to keep his features under control, while in the closet, Kanda and Link glance at each other in the pitch black, and push past the coats around them to press their ears to the closet doors.

(:~:)

Allen watches Evelyn as she stares out of the window at the sun-drenched street, her fingers obsessively tracing the pendant on her silver chain at her hip, biting her lip so hard it has turned white. Allen almost breaks the silence, but something in the way the light glances off her curled, black-clothed form on the sofa stops the words in his mouth.

In Evelyn's violet eyes swirl fractured motes of light, like shards of glass. Calmly, grimly, she weathers the grey storm within herself.

Seeing this, Allen somehow finds words. "Let's go after them."

"What?" Evelyn says, snapping up her head.

Allen gives her a smile that only he can; a genuinely joyful, ecstatic _grin_ that reaches his eyes, even though he harbours so much darkness behind his grey irises. "You're worried about them. So am I. They _are_ my nakama, after all." He tilts his head at her, white locks shaking. "And you are, too."

Evelyn stares at the floor, a curtain of sable hair hiding her expression. Then she raises her head as returns Allen's smile with her own rakish, insane grin, and tosses him his bag. "Get dressed. You're not fighting in pyjamas." She nods toward the bathroom.

A short while later, Allen examines himself in the bathroom mirror. His clothes are simple. A three-quarter length dark leather coat, sleek, but not glaringly shiny. Soft black leather boots and trousers. Durable. He turns and steps out of the bathroom.

Evelyn tilts her head at him and a light smile flits across her features. "A bit sombre, don't you think?" She reaches inside her pocket. "I think a little silver should do the trick." A well-known emblem on a pin sparkles in her hand, catching and magnifying the rays of the sun.

Allen stares at the Rose Cross in Evelyn's hand.

He finds himself unable to speak.

Slowly, his tongue loosens. "I…how could I possibly…" His grey eyes are reserved, yet desperately longing.

Evelyn shrugs. "Johnny plucked it off your ruined uniform. It's yours." Gently, she reaches down and pins it to his chest. She is somewhat surprised at the amount he has grown in three months, but she pauses, her hands on his shoulders. Violet eyes meet grey, and Evelyn murmurs to Allen, "You know none of us ever doubted you. You are, and always will be, an Exorcist."

Allen fingers the Rose Cross with his black-gloved hand. "Thank you," he whispers simply. "I've been seeking redemption."

"You never needed to."

(:~:)

At the end of the alley, Allen cocks his head at the slick, blank wall before them, and asks, "Hey. How do we get through that?"

"Can't you open it?" Evelyn looks at Allen quizzically.

Allen grins at her. "I can only control the White Ark, remember? I can't penetrate this dimensional barrier unless I try to merge the two Arks…which would be somewhat difficult."

"Looks like I'll have to step in," Evelyn murmurs, wicked smile spreading. She stands, feet together, before the wall, and closes her eyes. A slow breath makes its way into her lungs, invigorating her, sending lines of icy fire down her veins to her fingers, and her gloves shiver in anticipation. Feeling the power flow through her, Evelyn wills, _Acumen. Activate._ Her gloves whisper, and out of the blackbird sigils, card after card darts into the air, like butterflies in a gale, leaving a band of red around each bare hand. The wind buffets her hair and coat, wrapping her in sable. As the cards surround her, Evelyn opens her eyes, as amethyst as the flames flitting between Acumen, and taps a dainty finger to the wall. The cards reverse, and as if laughing, rustle as they flow to the wall, forming a rectangular pattern, evenly spaced, about six feet by three feet.

In the strange pause after, in a moment so powerful it is completely silent, Evelyn whispers, "Open." Crimson and violet lines of metallic liquid connect the cards, and spread to fill the spaces in between. Soon, a shimmering door, incandescent, iridescent, waits expectantly.

"That was…amazing," Allen breathes.

"Thank you, Allen," Evelyn replies sweetly, places her hand on the door, and swings it open lightly. The wood-paneled corridor beyond beckons. Evelyn squares her shoulders and steps forward. The moment of crossing is strange; it is as if the world turned to liquid glass around her, cool and silver, and she hears once more the melancholy chords of the Noah, Tyki's strains woven through them. After Allen follows, Acumen shivers, then returns to Evelyn's hands in a torrent, reforming her cut-off gloves.

"We're in," Allen whispers, as if he cannot quite believe it himself.

"Believe it," Evelyn grins. Her gloves begin to glow as she raises her hand in a certain direction. A laugh escapes her as she strides forward. "And I know exactly where Lavi and Bookman are."

(:~:)

Tyki's mind is reeling. He stares at the Earl numbly, as if unbelieving of what has fallen on his ears in the past hour. _Evelyn. They're going to use her Innocence to…_

The Earl chuckles, a high-pitched, hysterical sound. "With the Innocence of Understanding in our hands, we can utilize it to read any name. While before, the production of Akuma relied solely on the spoken name of the loved one, now, we can wrench the knowledge from humanity's minds." He tilts his head at Sheril. "And it can locate those with which it has come into contact with before."

Sheril shifts his weight on the sofa. "Well, if this gives me a chance to find Road…" A horrible leer, like a wound, spreads across his face. "When we capture this Exorcist, I'll torture her until she uses her Innocence for us."

In the closet, Kanda feels Link tighten his grip around his wrist, stopping him from leaping out and slicing them all to bits.

Tyki struggles to keep his breathing under control. "Why don't we just find the Innocence? It would be easier than getting her to work with us." He tries to keep the horror out of his voice.

The Earl blows away his hopes. "From what we see, her Innocence has evolved so that it is directly bound to her blood. We need her, Tyki-pet."

Sheril seems to consider something. "Or we could just extract all her blood and find a way to use that."

Tyki's golden eyes shiver.

(:~:)

In the damp, dimly lit luminance of a lowly prison cell, a red-haired head moves slightly against the wall. Blood cakes the fingers encased in torn leather cut-off gloves. The young man, known to his friends as Lavi, traces patterns on the flagstones beneath him, trailing his torn sleeves over the ground. A single green eye blearily blinks as he struggles to remember his identity, his _purpose_ of being here.

Months of excruciating agony and filth worm their way into his mind, threatening to take away what is dearest to him: Memories of his friends. Allen, who struggles so much with his light and dark sides, yet always filled with laughter; Yu, who would never allow Lavi to call him by his first name, now gone; Evelyn, bright and joyful and dancing with words and music; others at the Order, friends and colleagues; and one last memory, the most treasured one of all:

Lenalee twirls in the grey shades of Lavi's memory, adding colour by the twinkle in her purple eyes and the shine in her short green hair. They had always worked well together, backing each other up, saving each other. Lavi had admired her for her love of her friends. He often wonders what would have become of them if he had stayed in the Order; but perhaps that would be out of line for Bookman's Successor.

Blearily, Lavi hears footsteps outside his door, and wonders what other horrors Sheril can possibly summon.

Then a shaft of light falls across his filthy face and eye patch, and he blinks his right eye, watching the hazy figures before him. The foremost figure seems to be a girl, and Lavi feels a soft hand caress his cheek and touch the cuffs around his wrists and ankles.

"Lenalee…?" Lavi whispers, struggling to adjust his eyes in the sudden light. "Have you come to take me away?"

"We have come to take you home, Lavi," the girl says in a warm, familiar voice. Then the girl bends down and murmurs his Name into his ear. Lavi jolts and blinks, and realises Evelyn Merle crouches by him. "Evie?" he asks in wonder. He looks past her, and his face splits in a wide smile. "Allen! Good to see you! How've you been? I've been…fabulous."

Allen smiles in return, but his worried gaze betrays him. "I don't think you should be the one asking that question." Then he activates his Innocence, using the sharp fingers of his left arm to slice through Lavi's cuffs. "Can you walk?" he asks, extending his right hand.

Lavi takes Allen's proffered hand, wincing as his bruised fingers take his weight. He staggers upright, leaning on both Allen and Evelyn, and slowly begins to stride forward. With each step he finds new strength in his legs, despite the many cuts and bruises on him. "Gramps is in there…" he coughs, pointing to the cell to the left. The corridor is as decadent as ever, hiding the two cells of misery hidden behind the doors.

Evelyn allows Lavi to lean on her as Allen slices the door to shreds and returns a moment later with Bookman on his back. Something seems to break in Lavi's green gaze as he sees the frail, unconscious form of his grandfather.

"He'll be fine," Evelyn says quickly, giving Lavi a quick grin. "Let's get your Innocence."

They traipse down the hallway, Lavi limping and holding on to Evelyn for support, Allen carrying Bookman on his back.

(:~:)

"You look tense, Tyki-pet," the Earl says in concern. "Get some rest." Standing, he waddles over to the door and out of the room. "We should–" With a sudden jolt, he freezes, a look of confusion crossing his messed-up face.

Sheril sits up straighter. "Did I just feel…?"

Tyki senses something strong in the back of his mind, stepping boldly into the Ark. As if the Noah is singing in welcome. "Road's back," he says simply. _But if she's back, she'll be able to sense whomever comes in and out of the Ark. This is really, really bad._

Sheril explodes out the door, almost performing the near-sacrilege of knocking the Millennium Earl over. The Earl does not object, instead waddling after Sheril with unusual haste. Tyki slowly rises from his seat, and starts toward the door. _Look for Lavi and Bookman,_ he mouths to the gap in the closet doors, where he knows Kanda and Link watch him. Then he is gone.

The study is once more still.

Kanda and Link burst out of the closet, sweeping themselves free of a century of lint and mothballs. "We should get them before Road senses us," Link says. "She's a good distraction for all the Noah."

"Probably," Kanda says drily. They sprint to the door like two men on a mission, throw open the door, and nearly bowl over Evelyn, supporting a tired-looking red haired young man. Allen shouts and skids to a stop behind her.

A moment of silence.

"Yu-chaaaaan," Lavi groans cheerfully. "Welcome back. Knew you weren't dead, crazy idiot."

Kanda seems lost for words, then the yells, "I've told you before, Lavi, don't call be by my first name!" He fingers Mugen by his side, and murmurs, "I'll slice off that red hair of yours for selling."

"You haven't changed at all, Yu." Lavi grins. But he turns to Link and his eyes narrow. "Now, you…I've heard that you were dead. I didn't think you could return from it. Does Leverrier know you're here?"

"You don't trust me either? I missed you too, Bookman Junior," Link says airily. He, too, seems to be holding back a smile. Then he turns serious and asks Allen, "We need to get their weapons."

"Any ideas?" Evelyn asks.

Allen sucks in a sudden breath, and supports Bookman with a single hand while the other touches his heart. "I think…I think…" he murmurs. "Over there," he breathes, eyes wide. "My Innocence…senses it."

"Your Innocence can sense theirs?" Kanda asks curiously.

"Yes…" Allen gasps. "Hurry. My heart's throbbing."

Lavi's green eyes takes in all of this, searing the memory into his mind, filing it away to tell Bookman later. _The Heart Innocence…could it be…_ He shakes his head to clear it. _Concentrate on current events for now._

Link and Kanda each slip under one of Lavi's arms, relieving Evelyn of his weight. As they start down the corridor, Lavi drawls, "Well, right little bromance we have here. Didn't know you two cared so much."

"Shut up, Lavi," Kanda growls.

(:~:)

As they break down the door of the dark room, light falls through the dusty air to alight on the weapons hanging on the wall. Evelyn quickly crosses over to them and sticks Heaven's Compass into Bookman's pocket. The moment her hands touch Lavi's hammer, though, something feels _wrong._ The Innocence seems…unstable, shivering, as if pulsing in alternates of power and weakness.

"Lavi…" Evelyn murmurs.

Lavi snaps his head toward her, understanding just by the tone of her voice. With unspoken consent, Link and Kanda lower him to the floor, crouching beside him. Lavi reaches out, his hands, usually so steady, shaking with fatigue and fear.

"Innocence?" he asks, as if it were a living, breathing creature. Evelyn gently places the tiny hammer into Lavi's gloves, stands back, and waits.

A crack of blinding light streaks down the centre of the hammer, and it _disintegrates._ What is left is a pool of greenish-black liquid, smooth as mirrored glass on the grazed and bruised hands beneath. Lavi sucks in a breath, as if the movement pains him. _I've seen so much war…accepting this would be taking sides. But have I done that already? _A bitter laugh escapes him._ Gramps has always taught me to free myself from the ties of association. But is Innocence true freedom? I don't…I don't know…What do I…_

Evelyn knows the struggle within him, and so steps forward and places a hand on Lavi's shoulder. "Lavi," she says, "Look at me." Lavi raises his head, tears brimming in his one good eye. "Do you choose to be an Exorcist?" Evelyn whispers, "Or do you choose to be Bookman's successor?" she pauses. "They do not have to be separate," she smiles.

Lavi shudders as he stares at the Innocence. His birthright or his friendship. But a thought, meandering, sweet, enters his mind. Lenalee's last words to him. _"I'll see you after the mission. Good Luck, and I'll miss you."_ Her crystalline laughter dances around his mind.

_For Lenalee, and my nakama. Life wouldn't be worth living without them._ Lavi smiles his roguish smile, leans forward, and drinks the Innocence, tasting its power. _I'm sorry, Panda,_ he thinks almost humourously.

"Steel yourself," Evelyn murmurs, eyes hard.

Lavi closes his eyes as twin stigmata appear on his palms, and surging crimson follows the rapid beat of his heart, forming a winged figure that cocks its head at him. "Hey, nice to see you," Lavi says tiredly, smiling. "Let's go." The figure nods, and falls back into his hands, compressing its mass ever-smaller, until it becomes a dense, metallic matter that coalesces into a tiny hammer, of a red rich and deep. The colour of nobility.

Lavi cradles his new hammer, marveling at how light it is. He'd felt that his Innocence was alive before, but this… "This feels different," he wonders aloud. "More…right, somehow."

"It is," Evelyn and Kanda comment in unison. They glance at each other before snapping back to the present. "We need to go before the Noah leave Road," Kanda says.

"Road's back?" Allen and Evelyn exclaim. Allen seems strangely ambivalent. Road did save his life, after all. Evelyn's eyes harden. She isn't going to forgive the agony she suffered at Road's hands that easily.

A low, wry voice intrudes on their reverie. "Well, come on, then. Let's go!" The others turn to Lavi, surprised to see him on his feet and his new weapon in its holster. A new energy flames in his eye. "It's not like we're fighting alone, after all." His radiant smile once more adorns his features, and he laughs delightedly. "Let's go, nakama."

(:~:)

Tyki returns Road's hug as she wraps her arms tightly around his neck. "How did you make it back?" he asks, injecting warmth into his voice.

She flicks her spiky blue hair. "I fell into dreamscape, and floated awhile as I healed. There's no time there, you know. That's probably why I took so long getting back." Her golden eyes blink slyly. Leaning forward, she whispers in his ear, "And it seems I've gotten back just in time."

Tyki stares at her, uncomprehending, and looks over his shoulder. "Where's Sheril?" he calls to the Earl, who is sitting in an armchair wiping tears of joy from his eyes.

"Don't know," the Earl chokes.

Road's knowing laugh reaches Tyki's ears, and he leaps to his feet, saying hurriedly, "I'm going to find him." _Please don't find the others. Please don't._

(:~:)

Meanwhile, Lavi responds to Evelyn's opening of a door out of the Ark with considerable enthusiasm. After a few moments, Kanda whacks him on the back of the head to stop him from dancing around like a delighted child. Link, who has taken over carrying Bookman, hides a smile.

The door swings open to the crowded Order cafeteria. Thankfully, no Crow are present. A pulse of silence travels through the room, and amid the mass of people, a single figure stands up, silhouetted, separated in the plain of heads like a single flower in a field of grass.

"Lavi…" Lenalee breathes, eyes wide. She looks fragile, as if anything will make her cry.

Lavi's face turns as red as his hair.

Kanda breaks the moment by storming angrily through the portal and into the Order, Link following with Bookman on his back. Lavi staggers forward, as if drunk, and darts forward to envelop Lenalee in a hug. Lenalee begins to sob. Allen makes to follow, and both is feet are on the Order's side of the portal when Evelyn cries out for Tyki in a pain-filled voice, and the portal shivers with it, beginning to collapse.

"Evie!" Allen cries, turning back. Evelyn clutches her arm, a knife blade protruding from it. Behind her, a dark-haired Noah with a monocle smiles. "Brother Walker! Come and get your friend."

Allen knows without looking everyone else is too far away to help. Even though every nerve within him screams at him to stop, he darts forward and leaps through the closing door, landing on the other side in a pile of bloodied cards.

Kanda races back toward the portal, watching its amethyst rim shrink–

He is three feet from it as the portal disappears.

"No," Kanda says in a low voice, staring at the empty wall.

(:~:)

Tyki finally finds Sheril by a blank stretch of wooden paneling, leaning over and panting.

"Are you all right, Sheril?" Tyki asks uncertainly.

Sheril straightens and smiles saying, "Tyki, I've captured someone."

"What?" Tyki breathes, dark threads of horror paralyzing his limbs.

Sheril reaches forward and opens a door, dragging out an unconscious Allen with blood running down his forehead. "Our brother the Fourteenth was trying to save his friends, Bookman and that red-haired youth. I managed to intercept them as they were going through a portal."

"They?" Tyki can only speak in monosyllables.

"Yes, two men and a the young woman with the Innocence of Understanding were helping him. Unfortunately, I could only grab Walker." Sheril examines Tyki closely as he replies.

Tyki hides his sigh of relief with a cough and asks, "What are we going to do with him?"

Sheril shrugs. "Wait for his Noah to awaken. Shouldn't take too long now. Give me a hand."

Tyki bends down and gently takes Allen's arm, supporting his weight. Already his mind is going over schemes of helping Allen escape, but nothing comes to him in his desperation. Overwhelmingly, his relief for Evelyn washes over him.

Darker thoughts run through Sheril's mind. His brother had not fooled him with his talk, silvertongue as he is. Knowing that Tyki is no longer a friend to the Noah hurts him less than it should have. A black grin spreads across his features. _Well, let's see how things play out a while longer. I have things to do._

As their footsteps fade down the corridor, Evelyn closes her tear-filled eyes to the darkness of the room hidden behind, screaming Tyki's name behind the gag in her mouth. Acumen is stuffed into Sheril's pocket, and her hands are bound.

Allen Walker and the girl with the Innocence of Understanding have fallen into the hands of the Noah.

**I'm EVIL, I'm EVIL, MUAHAHAHAHA. Cliffie, no? Sorry. Couldn't resist. I also couldn't resist putting in the reference to a certain green-eyed Asgardian… (my beta, Waffles Risa, has written a fic about him, and IT IS GREAT. Please read _A Lost Son's Return_!) See you all next week.**


	3. Acumen

**Yay. Angst and fluff and humour, angsty fluff, fluffy humour, whatever. This chapter links back to some scenes in a Charade of Flames. I'm too tired to say more. I don't own D. Gray-Man or any of its characters.**

**Moonlight Arrow:**** Thank you so much for reviewing (and cheering me up wonderfully). You'll ride an emotional rollercoaster in this one, given what you wrote in the last part of your review. Tyki x Evelyn stuff. Hehe. Hope you like it!**

_Do you know who you are, my friend,_

_In half-forgotten past?_

_Of memories and darker times_

_When you walked in twilight vast?_

_Do you know who you are, dear friend,_

_And all the lives you took?_

_Does blood and guilt drip ever from_

_The pages of your book?_

_Only when you know yourself_

_Will you ever truly see_

_The light that shines within the chords_

_Of music strong and free._

(:~:)

The world is disjointed; sparks of agony dance across Evelyn's vision, like cheerless fireworks that serve no purpose but to increase the pounding of her heart. Her lips are parched, and she can barely move them to speak. Harsh metal cuffs scratch her wrists raw, while her ankles are bound painfully tight. All around her, the room is made of blued tiles that shiver and reflect ghastly visions of their occupants, as if mirroring their cries. Evelyn leans her head against the back of the hard chair, trying desperately not to scream.

Sheril Kamelot sneers as he watches her, caressing a glass of wine. He sits comfortably in an armchair before her, legs crossed, head tilted at her. "What?" he asks in his diplomat's voice.

Evelyn manages to gasp out a few words. "You're manipulating my hands until they're going to snap." Her fingers feel splintered. The knife wound in her arm throbs.

"So I am. What of it?"

"What is your purpose in doing this?"

Sheril looks deeply offended, and places his glass of wine on the table next to him. "My dear girl, do you not know?" He leans forward slowly. "We _need_ your co-operation, sweetie," he says easily. "Without you, your Innocence here" – he gestures at the gloves on the table – "is trash. And we need your help so badly." A wily, pleading note enters his voice.

"Why do I get the impression you're liking this far too much?" Evelyn snarls, violet eyes murderous.

"Because I am, my dear."

The simple laughter in Sheril's words push Evelyn over the edge. "Why don't you go and kill yourself, you –" Evelyn throws out a colourful mash of curses, many she learnt on the streets of Guangzhou, allowing their flavour to lance off her tongue, hurling them at Sheril's pretty, chiseled face until–

Evelyn gasps, choking on the words as she feels an explosion of pain in her throat. She tastes blood. Opening her mouth, she formulates the worst curse she knows and prepares to yell it at Sheril.

She can't.

Evelyn freezes, eyes wide and uncomprehending. Sheril has taken her gift with words.

Evelyn can't speak.

Sheril's macabre smile spreads like an open wound as he listens to her tears fall like raindrops on the blue-tiled floor.

(:~:)

Tyki straightens abruptly. He feels as if a cold, dead hand has grasped his heart and filled his lungs with lead. His breathing guttural and uneven, he closes his eyes and leans forward, putting his head in his hands. _Someone just walked over my grave. Or tap-danced over it with metal shoes._

"Are you all right?"

Startled, Tyki snaps open his eyes to see Allen's grey gaze levered on him. Allen shifts slightly to move his wrists, which are encased in manacles on his chair. "You look like hell," he comments.

"I'm fine," Tyki answers. He glances at the Exorcist. "Are _you_ ok? Sheril bashed you quite painfully over the head. I've been waiting for you to wake for over a day and a half now."

Allen sighs and looks at the ceiling. "I take it Sheril still doesn't know that you're with us?"

"Of course. I just need to work out a way to get you out of here without compromising my position," Tyki says flatly. "Nice place, huh?" He gestures at the sumptuously decorated living room, lavishly carpeted and covered. Allen's chained chair is the only thing out of place.

A pause. "Is Evie safe?" Allen asks quietly.

Tyki's golden eyes narrow, and he leans forward. "What do you mean?" he asks dangerously.

A look of horror passes over Allen's features. "I came back through the portal because Sheril was attacking Evie. Didn't you know?" Tyki bursts to his feet, nearly running for the door, but Allen's words stop him in his tracks. "Don't. If you go searching for her now, they'll know you're siding with us. If you're compromised, then I cannot escape, and neither can Evie."

Tyki slowly turns back, and when he speaks, his words are heavy. "But what can we do?" Unbidden, desperation makes its way onto his face. "Every moment we tarry is Evelyn's pain."

Allen seems to deflate. "I don't know." His grey eyes shimmer, and he asks emotionlessly, "What will happen to me?"

"Sheril…has his methods," Tyki murmurs.

Allen gives a bitter smile. "I won't give in. The Noah will never control me."

A sudden light brightens in Tyki's gaze. A wild laugh suddenly escapes him like a pent-up breath. "I know what to do," he says. "But you'll have to let me."

"What?" Allen says eagerly.

"Let me help you learn to control your Noah."

Nine words. Nine innocent, simple words that drip into Allen's mind like poison. He finds himself speechless. After dry-swallowing a few times, he finally manages, "I can't."

A drop of hardness enters Tyki's golden gaze. "You can't?" he intones softly.

"I can't! I won't give in to the Noah, I…I won't allow that!" Allen yells.

Tyki nods, understanding. "Ah. So you _can_ do it, you just _won't._" He paces towards the door.

"No! That's not what I–"

"Of course it is," Tyki snaps, wheeling around to glare at him. "You're letting your fear of the Noah overwhelm your logic. The Noah is going to gain control of you anyway, so why do you shirk away from your duty, _boy?_"

At this, Allen's mouth snaps shut. He simply gazes at Tyki, eyes narrowed.

Tyki closes his eyes, and takes a slow breath. "Allen," he begins almost gently, "Do you want to become who I was when I nearly killed you?" The question hangs in the air, coiled and tensed. Tyki watches Allen, hands clasped behind his back.

"No," Allen whispers, defeated.

"And you will not kill like I have killed," Tyki continues softly. "I killed strangers barely known to me. You will kill those who you hold most dear." He lifts his cool gaze to meet Allen's tortured one, and something sharp and insurmountable enters his golden irises. "And if you do anything to Evelyn, I will simply _end you_."

Allen drops his white-haired head to stare at the floor. Then he sighs, and his shoulders slump. "Alright."

Tyki's cool voice flows effortlessly, like the finest champagne. "Very well, then. I'll return after I am satisfied Evelyn is safe."

(:~:)

Lavi shifts his weight in his hospital bed and hollers across the room, "Oi, Yu-chan, stop pacing like that. It's giving me a headache."

Kanda halts mid step, his cerulean hair swinging, obscuring the fire in his glare. The force of his gaze could burn holes in the floor. Then he resumes his stride, hands locked behind his back, boots noiselessly covering the same stretch of ground, the long, sable edges of his coat melding with his shadow. His dark eyes burn beneath his straight fringe.

Lavi feels a gentle hand on his arm. "Let him be, Lavi," Lenalee murmurs from the chair beside his bed. She smiles warmly at him, her shoulder-length hair waving. "He's worried about Evie, and rightly so."

"But he shouldn't heap it all on himself," Lavi replies, unconsciously grasping her hand. "The fault is mostly mine."

Lenalee reaches out and turns his face towards her, staring him directly in his one good eye. "How can you say that?" she breathes, her gentle gaze beseeching him to reply as only she can.

"If we hadn't been in the Black Ark in the first place…" Lavi sighs. His green eye, usually so filled with laughter, is downcast. The bandages on his face stand out stark white beside the black of his eye patch. His flaming hair, usually so painstakingly untamed, hangs floppily, his headscarf gone.

"You're worried about your Innocence," Lenalee sighs, feeling melancholy wash over her. Both her hands softly hold his. "You know Bookman understands why you crystal-typed, right?"

Lavi's voice is uncharacteristically choked as he resumes staring at Kanda pace. "I don't think he does." Bookman had simply turned away and bowed his head, silent, when the Science department had informed him of Lavi's crystal type. Bookman had spoken not a word to Lavi since, and something about the way his shoulders are curled in defeat as he sleeps stabs at Lavi's heart.

He starts as Lenalee's hand strokes his hair. "I'm so glad you're back," she whispers, although tears threaten to spill down her face.

"I didn't want you to worry," Lavi murmurs in return, brushing the tears out of her eyes. They gaze at one another, for once, silent.

A voice wails in desperation, "NOOOOOOO! MY LEEENAAALEEEEEEEE!"

Lavi and Lenalee both snap towards the door, where Komui is standing, bawling his eyes out. An enormous bouquet of flowers dangles from his shaking fingers. In an instant, Lenalee leaps away from Lavi's bedside.

"Nii-san…" Lenalee says quietly, her cheeks turning crimson.

"Komui-san," Lavi smiles his usual dazzling grin, his tone returning light. "Please don't–"

"GET AWAY FROM MY LENALEEEEEEE!" Komui screams, starting toward Lavi, brandishing the bunch of roses and pansies like a sword. Petals fly everywhere, raining down on Lavi and Lenalee like summer rain. "What did you think you were doing? I'm going to skin you–"

Komui's words are stopped short as the Matron promptly stomps in, grabs him by the ear, and proceeds to shake it vigourously. "Director!" she shrieks, even louder than he did. "If you're just here to make a scene, get out!" Her fingers whiten like pincers on Komui's reddening ear. Komui continues to sob, flailing his arms pathetically in Lavi's direction.

Then a low voice intercedes. "Tch," Kanda snarls, stalking over and grabbing Komui by the collar. At this, the Matron releases Komui's ear, drawing back in expectation. In a quiet tone, strangely emotional, Kanda whispers, "Sister Complex. Let the two of them be." His gaze sinks like bottomless pits into Komui's wide eyes. "They're _happy_. At least your sister is, to a point," Kanda laughs, a harsh, barking sound. He looks away. "Let them be happy, at least for a while, as I seem to be the only one truly worried about Evelyn. Otherwise," Kanda narrows his eyes, "_Concentrate on_ _how to get Evie back._"

Komui bows his head, chastened. Lavi stares in shock. Kanda gives one more glare at the room in general, then pushes Komui away and strides out of the room, nearly running over Tiedoll.

Tiedoll's gaze follows his fading figure. "Any news?" he asks dully.

"None," Komui replies, straightening his white coat and beret.

Tiedoll glances at Lenalee, who has once more taken Lavi's hand, and grins tiredly. "Good job, the both of you. Finally," he sighs before turning to go.

Komui inches closer to Lenalee and gently ruffles her hair. Then he surprises them both by proffering a hand. Lavi slowly reaches out and shakes it. "I'll skin you alive later," Komui sniffs, as if every word chokes in his throat.

"Al…right?" Lavi hazards.

Looking perilously close to tears, Komui staggers out, muttering, "I'll find Evie and Allen now."

"Finally," Lavi and Lenalee sigh together.

(:~:)

Tyki is beginning to despair.

He has ran all the ways of the Ark that he knows, listening at every door and reading the disturbances in the air and ground, searching for the merest whisper of Evelyn's presence. Different dimensions of the Ark have different tastes, some humming with power, and some tasting of iron. Stone and metal, wood and gold, dirt and the contrived sky of the Ark stretching for what seems like miles, but ends after a few steps.

In the end, Tyki slides to a halt in a pure white circular room made of glaringly bright material, with seamless walls and floors that appears to have no doors. Bending over and panting, Tyki tries to get the maddening drumbeat of his heart to slow, but his music is everywhere, dancing to a frantic tempo in his ears. The sound of his footsteps rebounds around the glassy walls.

When his breathing has lightened somewhat, Tyki examines the featureless room, listening to its whispers and its echoes. Strangely, the Ark's music seems amplified here, melody on melody forming an unearthly harmony. But within the broken chords and dark tunes of the Noah, Tyki hears a single flute play the intricate, lilting melody that he knows so well. The notes shine with the cold light of stars and twinkle with the luminence of amethysts, laughing, yet sorrowful. _Evelyn's music_.

Tyki breathes out, relief flooding through him, and plunges his entire being into the flow of song, letting the power add to his speed. Following Evelyn's trail of music notes that dance around him like cards in a gale, Tyki darts through doors and archways, his steps ever surer, waltzing to the swelling current of sound–

And smashes into a plain black wall.

As he massages his nose, Tyki reaches out and lays a hand on the smooth surface of the void, and finds it slippery, like oiled marble. No matter what he does, his fingers refuse to penetrate the sable. Evelyn's music hums with raw power through here, so she must be close, so close…

But he can't get through.

Tyki leans his forehead against the wall, feeling the chill seep through him, hardening him against desperation. _Please._ Then a fluttering noise by his right ear snaps open his eyes. "What?" he breathes, staring at the golden golem hovering in front of him. Slowly, he reaches out, allowing the golem to rest on his palm. "Timcampy. That's your name, isn't it?" he says wonderingly. "You're Allen's golem."

Timcampy bobs and nips Tyki's fingers with his teeth, then waves the plume of his tail and darts over to the wall. Tyki watches in awe as Tim's tail dips into the inky darkness and draws a long rectangle of dazzling white in the black. The wall between the white lines shudder and ripple, then simply disappears.

Behind the wall is a blue-tiled chamber.

Chained to the far wall of the chamber, blinking at the sudden light, is Evelyn. She shrinks back, mistaking him for Sheril.

Tyki feels something raw and aching boil up within his throat. He stumbles forward a step; his feet are so heavy. Like a drunken man, he staggers over to Evelyn and clumsily waves a handful of dark matter at the manacles, releasing them. As Tyki falls to his knees beside Evelyn, she recognizes him, simply slides down the wall and collapses into his arms. He becomes aware of the awkward way she holds her hands, and hisses as he sees her bruises. A horrible mix of concern and fury wells up within him.

After a while, Tyki asks hoarsely, "Evelyn?"

She raises her head to reveal agony-filled violet eyes and opens her mouth, but no sound comes. Her eyes glisten, but she does not weep. Tyki stares down at her, uncomprehending, terrified that she is refusing to speak to him because he was unable save her from pain. The nub of fear spreads like poison around his heart, then he sees Evelyn cough up blood, and his hand steadies her.

And Tyki slowly understands. "Did he take away…" he taps her lips with a cool finger. Evelyn nods, and Tyki gives a strange sort of hiss and presses his forehead to her temple. "I'm sorry," he blurts, trying to give her some sort of comfort. "I'm sorry." He doesn't give her any reasons. Tyki knows Evelyn understands.

Instead, he pulls her closer and hugs her tightly. He feels her do the same and bury her face in his shirt. For a long while, they lean against the wall, illuminated by the bar of light from the open cell door. Timcampy hovers outside, sentinel.

Slow tears begin to fall from Tyki's golden eyes. When he realises this, he nearly laughs. It is only the second time he has ever cried in his life. Evelyn feels the drops land on her hair and looks up, favouring him with a tired smile. Gently, she reaches up and wipes his tears away, sending him quiet comfort with her softened gaze.

Tyki hurriedly dries his face on his sleeve, and murmurs in the gloom, "You'll be fine, Evelyn. I promise you that. But you know what I have to do." He hates himself to have to tell her this, abhors his logic. "I have to help Allen control his Noah. It's the only way to get the both of you out alive without implicating my position in the Ark, and compromising all intel." He raises her chin. "Do you understand me, Evelyn?"

Evelyn's gaze is grim, but she nods and half-smiles, as she always does in danger. Then she leans against him and closes her eyes. Tyki does the same, shutting off the world around them so, for a few moments, all is safe, with Evelyn in his arms and their music around them.

Then Tyki ignores the tearing in his heart and loosens his embrace. Evelyn shakes her head desperately and clings to him, but he stops her with a kiss on the cheek and helps her stand. Her hand goes into her pocket and hands Mikky, deactivated, to Tyki. As he refastens the manacles around her wrists, Evelyn steels herself and nods to show she understands.

Tyki stoops to plant a farewell kiss on her forehead, and turns away, his fingers flicking away from her cheek. "I promise I'll be back," he calls, and quickly strides through the doorway.

As the wall of darkness once more closes behind him, Tyki hears Evelyn's silent words: _You'd better, Moron._ Tyki closes his eyes as he speeds away.

(:~:)

Lavi's hospital room is getting rather crowded.

Kanda sulks in a corner, sitting on the padded bench under the window, one boot resting on the casement, then other dangling toward the floor. This mood seems as dark as his coat. Lenalee has fallen asleep in a chair with her head resting on the bed by Lavi's side, and Lavi's hand is gently stroking her hair off her brow. Krory yawns, his lanky form stretched over a bench, glancing toward the door. Chaojii had named Allen a traitor, and so refuses to join them in waiting.

Tiedoll sketches methodically from an armchair, finding escape in art. The two people he is drawing, on the other side of the room, are unaware of this. Marie had turned up a while ago with Miranda trailing him, and they sit silently off to the side, holding hands absentmindedly for comfort. The little scene flows from pencil to paper. However, Tiedoll's worry is evident in the pile of crunched-up sketch paper next to him.

Ecstatic shouting echoes down the corridor, and Reever's voice can be heard yelling, "Director! If you could just stay calm–" Komui appears at the ward entrance, batting Reever aside as he waves a slip of paper above his head.

"Tyki's just contacted us with Mikky!" Komui exclaims to the room in general.

Lenalee stirs and turns to Komui, hands clasped together, while Marie, Miranda and Tiedoll jump up. Kanda simply turns his head towards Komui, and asks in a low voice, "Good news?"

Komui falters slightly, and then he beams and says, "As good as we can get." He is somewhat breathless from the run and the screaming, so Reever snatches the paper out of his hand and reads it aloud himself.

"Evelyn and Allen safe for the moment," Reever smiles, ruffling up his blond hair even more. In the general sigh of relief, he continues. "Unable to get them out without compromising my position. Will teach Allen to control his Noah. Then they will both escape. Will contact you with further developments. Mikk out."

Silence, heavy and dampening like mist, falls on them.

Kanda speaks first. "So the coward refuses to help them if he is revealed as a traitor to the Noah." He snorts. "Of course." Hysteria has crept into his voice.

To his surprise, Lenalee is the one who answers him. "How can you say that, Kanda?" she says softly, balling her hands into fists and stalking towards him. Lavi extends a hand to stop her, but she pushes him away and continues to pace right up to Kanda. "Do you know how much he cares for the both of them?" she whispers, voice cracking. "He is our only link inside the Black Ark. Without him, Allen _and_ Evie will be lost. So,"– and here she stabs a finger in Kanda's chest – "Stop being so idiotically selfish."

The tension hangs like a fragile glass plate, ready to shatter with the slightest shake. Kanda stares at the ground for the longest while, then he looks Lenalee straight in the eye and answers in the barest of whispers, "You're right." Then the slips off the casement and strides between his shocked master and colleagues, and out of the room.

Lavi gives a low whistle. "He really does care for Evie, doesn't he?"

Tiedoll swallows. "I'm afraid he does. And I'm afraid he'll never let go."

(:~:)

A scrabbling of fingers against manacles.

A smooth voice, like black silk polishing ice says, "My, my, dear girl, you must invoke your Innocence. You do realise I know about Tyki mooning over you?"

Evelyn stares up at him, to tired to even weep.

"My brother was always…more human than I would have liked."

The desperate thought, _Please, no._

(:~:)

A grim smile twists Allen's lips. Sheril had visited a while ago, and dumped a whole lot of sugary rubbish in his ears. _Brother, brother, come to us, we'll accept you; just give in to your Noah, blah blah blah._ After Sheril had got bored, he left. Allen rolls his eyes and waits, still chained to the chair.

The door swings open and Tyki walks in, Mikky hovering by his ear. One look at him reveals the weight on his shoulders. Tyki comes to a halt in front of Allen and doesn't speak for a while. Allen waits expectantly.

"Let's begin," Tyki says, with the dry, cracked voice of worry. "Don't worry, Evelyn is fine." He crouches down so he is at Allen's eye level. His golden eyes are liquid fire. "The first thing you need to do is to accept that the Noah is a part of you."

"I have," Allen answers.

"No you haven't," Tyki retorts emotionlessly. "To accept the Noah is to stop building walls around it and to figure out its intents. No walls you ever build will be strong enough."

A certain degree of fear enters Allen's grey eyes. "But if I give in–"

"Yes," Tyki replies harshly. "You could turn into what I was. But Allen," – and here he grins – "You're much, much stronger than I was when I turned into a Noah. And a much better person."

"It's spreading," Allen gasps, grey creeping into his skin. "I don't want it to– I can't control–"

"Think of your Nakama," Tyki urges. "And bind the Noah with them. Your Innocence is a part of you. Infuse your memories with Innocence and wrap them around your heart."

"I don't know how to do this!" Allen screams, the world flashing black and white around him as the Noah sinks insidious tendrils into his mind.

Through the lightning and blackness and mist, he hears Tyki whisper, "You never know how to control it until you are in the midst of it. I brought my Noah under control with music. Do you know how much more powerful your Innocence is?"

Allen takes a sobbing breath, clenches his hands, and prepares to activate his Innocence.

The world warps around them, and Tyki gasps as he feels Evelyn's tortured voice scream in his mind, "_Understand!_" Belatedly, Tyki knows that Evelyn must have invoked her Innocence to a degree previously unknown, and Sheril is close to breaking her.

As he sinks into memories, he calls out blindly to her, asking for forgiveness.

(:~:)

In the grey shades of his memories, Tyki, dressed in a white, high-collared coat, sees _himself,_ two years ago now, in a tuxedo of black, sauntering towards a mansion with fire leaping out of its windows. White Tyki watches as Black Tyki calls the flames to cease, and rises up through the second-floor window. White Tyki follows, drawn by an inexpressible curiosity, though something gnaws at his insides, foreboding horror.

White Tyki watches the Finder cower by the wall as Black Tyki smashes his communications box; watches as the powerful man in sable summons two Tease into his gloved fingers and pushes it into the Finder's chest. White Tyki screams at the black figure to stop, but as with all dreams, he cannot control the world around him, and no sound comes out.

Tyki watches himself torture another man until boredom wins over, and the man, finally, dies. Horrified, he curls into a ball, drawing his knees up to his chin as the scene fades away to the cobbles of walled city. _Barcelona._ He knows what is next; but his eyelids refuse to close, and as a young Exorcist with a bell on his pointed hood walks by him, he tries to reach out and grab the Exorcist's ankle, but his hand passes through like mist and water.

_No. Please, no. Don't make me watch this. I don't want to understand what I was. I was a monster._

Sobbing, Tyki remains an observer as his dark self _plays_ with Daisya Barry until he slips a Tease in his heart, and Daisya breathes his last.

The world dissolves into a mirrored pool, and Suman Dark splashes Tyki in the face as he flees past, Dark Tyki following, laughing and waltzing to sable music. As the Exorcists fall, Tyki watches himself, horror freezing his body racking him with pain.

Tyki kneels by Suman Dark as his Black self gives a macabre laugh, pouring Tease into him. The sun sets on the mirrored surface of the pool, where twin reflections of a man with golden eyes an dark hair reside. One, standing tall, and the other kneeling, broken.

And finally.

Allen.

Tyki screams as he watches himself stab his arm through Allen's heart and scatter cards around him. Dark music swells and overwhelms him.

At last, blessed unconsciousness creeps over white-clothed Tyki Mikk. _I'm sorry, Evelyn,_ he whispers in his mind, as finally, he truly understands who he once was.

(:~:)

Allen blinks, slowly coming back to himself. He had walked some forgotten memories with Mana, and the tears that streak his cheeks hold testimony to them. More recent ones had included Cross taking care of him at Mother's, and his master's echoing voice telling him to walk on his own. Now, as his blurred vision clears, he sees Tyki curled into a ball at his feet. He looks up, and rocks back in his chair in shock.

General Cross Marian grins as he meets his apprentice gaze. "Well, Bakadeshi," he drawls, lazily cutting through his manacles, "Why do I always have to save your hide?" His flaming hair is the same as ever, but his mask, once white, is now black. Timcampy rests on his head. He wears a fine sable traveler's cloak, but the Rose Cross is absent.

"Master…" Allen stammers, slowly getting up. "I thought…"

"Yeah, you thought I was dead," Cross rolls his eyes, grabbing Allen's collar and hauling him away from the chair. "I'd like to say I was touched by your grief at my 'passing', but really, I don't care."

As Cross drags him towards the door, Allen motions at Tyki's unconscious form and says, "We have to take him."

"No," Cross says shortly. Grave of Maria rises up next to them, Maria beginning her song of shielding. "We have to hurry, while the Noah are still in the throes of their memories."

"Evelyn will never forgive us. And he was helping me," Allen pants.

"Ugh. Fine. You carry him," Cross twangs. "I'll be back in a moment with Evelyn."

In the next few minutes, Allen tries to wake Tyki, but nothing works. Finally, he bends down next to Tyki's ear, and murmurs, "You suck at poker."

Tyki sits up so fast he bangs his forehead against the wall. "Ouch," he comments, staring up at Allen. "What happened?" he asks, turning white. "Evelyn–"

A powerful voice snaps, "I've got her."

Tyki and Allen turn to the door, where Cross stands tall, an unconscious Evelyn in his arms. Acumen is back in glove form, on Evelyn's hands. Tyki opens his mouth to say something, but Cross snaps, "Shut it," and motions with his head. Timcampy flies to the wall and draws a door with his tail.

Cross stomps across the room and nudges a dazed Tyki and Allen through the door with his foot. Then the door seals behind them, and they are out of the Black Ark.

Across the Ark, the Millennium Earl raises his head from memories and screams in fury.

(:~:)

Tyki stumbles behind Cross, his mind blurred as he tries to take in his surroundings. They are standing in a sunlit lane lines with rows of neat cottages, behind which fields of corn are visible. The warm light caresses them and birdsong flits between the trees. A quiet suburb in England.

"What…" he murmurs. This is rewarded by a sharp clip on his ear by Cross, who hands him Evelyn. Tyki looks down at her, worried by how pale she looks, and the shallowness of her breaths.

"We're in Mother's town," Allen breathes, looking around them.

Tyki doesn't even bother to ask any more. Tiredness is making his head droop, and Evelyn is weighing down on his arms. He makes a mental note not to mention this to her. She'd probably kill him.

So Tyki and Allen follow Cross down a few bright lanes to a little white cottage, where the door flies open and a portly man with rosy cheeks runs over to them, exclaiming over his shoulder, "Mother! They're here!"

Inside the cottage, Tyki and Allen find themselves given a bowl of hot soup each, after Tyki makes sure Evelyn is tucked into bed in a spare room, and Cross grumbles and lights a cigarette.

Barba, the fat man, bustles around them, offering them more food, but Tyki is already asleep, his head resting on the table and his hand still on his soupspoon. Allen does the same.

Mother, puffing away on her own cigarette, watches the little scene before her with a small smile on her gnarled face. "Look at him, he's so handsome," she growls, looking at Tyki's sleeping face. "She's a very lucky girl." Mother motions at the spare room, where Evelyn is.

"He can't be better looking than me," Cross mumbles self-importantly.

"He is," Mother says flippantly. "Live with it." She breaks out into hoarse chuckles, coughing.

Cross spits out his cigarette, Tim catching it in midair and eating it.

**Yes. I brought Cross back. I have this theory he is still alive in the manga Did you the chapter? I didn't know whether it worked or not. Things escalate quite a bit in the next chapter. Please review. I've been getting fewer emails than usual and I'm getting bored (don't get me wrong, you guys all rock). See you next week!**


	4. Hearts

**Ok, this is my take in what could possibly happen in the manga to Allen. Of course, I could be completely wrong (I probably am), but it sure was fun writing it. (I got this chapter to you when I've got about four major projects due in on Monday) I don't own D Gray-Man or any of its characters.**

**lotusmelody17: Thank you so much for reviewing. I wasn't sure how well I had structured the emotion in the last chapter, and your response made me very, very happy. Hope you'll enjoy this **

**MercenaryCrime: Thank you for favoriting!**

_Upon some strange twist of Fate,_

_Where you once saw black and white_

_Now is shimmering gray._

_And if the gray man had a Heart,_

_In what shadowy, darkened night_

_Could he lead you to lighted way?_

(:~:)

Tyki has woken up to many different things before. As a young boy, he has shaken awake sharply by Sheril after a particularly painful fall, and when older, opened his senses to find the world covered in music when his Noah awoke. In recent years, he has woken to find the painting-covered wall of his room in the Black Ark shimmering with artificial sunlight, but the music of the Noah subdued.

Today is somewhat different.

Tyki barely suppresses a yell of shock as he squirms away from the table. Slouched at the opposite side of the small round surface, Cross mumbles in his sleep, smelling of drink, a hand still wrapped around a bottle of wine. _Good_ wine, too, by the label. Expensive. Tyki stands for a moment, pondering the waste of something so expensive on someone so pathetic. The music readings Tyki gets from Cross are muted and slurred. Cross gives a little snore, his mess of red hair shivering. Timcampy snoozes peacefully amid the flames of his fringe, golden wings drooping down to Cross's ears.

"Disgusting, isn't it?"

The voice jolts Tyki, and he turns to find Allen staring with clear grey eyes at his master. Dispassionately, Allen continues, "Strangely enough, I'm used to him doing this now. Doesn't make it any less revolting, though."

"How's Evelyn?" Tyki groans.

Allen gives a small smile. "Healing. Whatever Sheril did to her voice, it isn't permanent."

Tyki hides his elation in a cough and mumbles, "I'll go to see her now." As he rises from the table, rubbing his cheek to dispel the ache of resting it on a hard surface, Mother stomps in from another room and hands Tyki two cups of tea.

"That one's medicinal," she growls, pointing with one gnarled finger at one of the cups. "Tell her not to speak until I allow her to." The finger reaches up to touch Tyki's chin. Tyki tries not to squirm away from the smell of drink around her. "You're a handsome one, aren't you?" Mother chuckles. "Well, I think Miss Exorcist is a very lucky girl."

"Uh…" Tyki mutters, cheeks flaming.

"Go on, then," Mother hacks, pushing him toward the door.

As Tyki disappears, Allen looks at Mother and says with a dark grin, "Should we wake Master up?"

"I'll get the restorative," Mother replies, her wrinkled mouth spreading in an evil smile of her own. "He won't like this, but that's all part of the fun, isn't it?"

(:~:)

Evelyn is staring moodily out of the window when Tyki enters, juggling the cups of tea as he struggles to close the door. But she raises an eyebrow, mirth tugging at the corners of her lips, as he finally manages to place the tea on her bedside table. Her bandaged hands are very still on the coverlet.

Tyki, seeing her expression, says indignantly, "I'm still my graceful self. I just woke up to find Cross snoring drunkenly in his sleep across the table. Give me some credit for not kicking him right then!"

Evelyn chuckles, which leads into a round of coughing, as her injured vocal cords struggle to heal. Tyki quickly carries over her tea and supports the cup as she drains it. Her hands tremble slightly as they wrap around the handle, bandages doing nothing to cover their weakness. When she is done, she looks up at him with a question in her eyes.

"Mother says your voice will heal," Tyki says consolingly. Evelyn brightens, but scowls again when he adds, "But in order for it to do so fully, you can't speak until she says you can." He grimaces and murmurs almost to himself, "It's not ideal, but at least you'll recover."

Evelyn huffs as she waves a hand angrily, but Tyki doesn't miss her quickly hidden grin. They sit awhile, the quiet amiable, him finding nothing he wants to say and she grateful for his silence. Tyki stares out of the window, absentmindedly holding her bandaged hand tenderly as the light spears dust motes and pollen in the morning air around them. A single blackbird trills outside, and Evelyn cocks her head at the sound, envy coursing through her. Then she turns to Tyki and finds his gaze dark as he stares at the greenery surrounding the cottage, fields of wheat of a lighter gold than his eyes.

Tyki starts and flicks his gaze to Evelyn as the bandages of her hands stroke his chin. She tilts her head at him, worry and sorrow mixing in her expression. Tyki sighs, and murmurs, "I should have known I couldn't keep this from you." He tries to sound emotionless as he asks, "Did you…know what you did in the Ark?"

Evelyn nods slowly, understanding dawning on her features.

"What you did…it affected me too," Tyki whispers. In a voice not his own, he continues, "I…I saw…what I was, before I met you." He looks at her, something breaking within him. "What I did to those people…Did you see who I truly am?" There is no fear in his voice. Just a tired resignation in his bitter smile. "Would you hate me?"

Evelyn cocks her head at him for a long moment, her liquid gaze holding no pity or malice. Tyki's heartbeat triples. Then Evelyn simply reaches forward and pulls him into a hug. In that hug, she conveys all she cannot say; her acceptance, and her love for him. Tyki breathes out slowly, relief flooding him, and returns her embrace.

"Thank you," Tyki murmurs into Evelyn's hair.

He feels her shift. _For what?_

"For not pitying me, but understanding," Tyki answers. Although he cannot see her, he feels her smile.

(:~:)

An anguished cry from the kitchen has Tyki slamming open the door and Evelyn craning forward to look at the source of the commotion. What they see cause Tyki to crumple over in mirth and Evelyn to break into a wide smile.

General Cross staggers around the kitchen, his face almost as crimson as his hair, clutching his throat with one hand and waving the other comically, smashing into the walls and over the table. Strange gasping noises exude from his gaping mouth and sweat pours over his face. Timcampy hovers above him. In a corner, Mother, Allen and Barba collapse to the floor, peals of hysterical laughter exploding out of them.

With a throaty cackle, Mother growls delightedly, "Knew my chilli essence would work! It always does."

"My insides!" Cross howls, scrabbling about with his hands. "My hair is on fire!"

"Shouldn't you be used to that?" Tyki gasps from in between spasms.

Cross barely has time to throw him a murderous look before his groping hands find a pitcher of water and pours it down his throat, splashing the rest around his face. As the soaking wet, limp-haired General finally comes to a halt, everyone stops chuckling to simply take in the beauty of the scene.

Flicking aside his damp hair, Cross raises a finger at Allen, and says darkly, "Not a word to anyone, Bakadeshi."

"Yes, Master," Allen replies, face blank.

(:~:)

Later, when Cross has steamed dry in front of the fireplace with a cup of restorative tea next to him, Tyki and Allen share a look, and Tyki slips out of the room. After a moment, he returns carrying Evelyn, setting her down on the sofa and sitting next to her. Evelyn does not seem to need any explanations, but rather hugs the thick shawl tighter around her pyjamas against the breeze from the window, leaning back against the sofa. Allen walks over and sprawls on the other side of Evelyn. The three of them form a row on the sofa, eyes glittering as they stare at Cross.

Cross seems fascinated by the red jewels of the fire, but finally, he grunts in acknowledgement and growls, "What do you want to know?"

"Everything," Allen replies intensely, "But let's begin with how you're still alive." A slight edge of pain filters into his voice here.

"Apocryphos used Judgement on me," Cross says plainly.

"How did it possibly–"

"How did it get Judgement away from me?" Cross laughs, a harsh, barking sound. "I fired as soon as its filthy toe stepped in the door. But Innocence," – he points at Allen's left arm – "can't pierce Innocence." A hungry look enters his one visible eye.

For a while, the flickering firelight casts weirdly dancing shadows over their faces, and the sunlight outside the window seems further away.

Cross sighs, and Allen shivers as he realises his master is _fumbling for words_. Finally: "It moves faster than anything that's cursed enough to walk the fell ways of this Earth. It…It _flicked_ my bullets away, and wrestled Judgement from my fingers."

"And then?" Allen asks, eyes wide with horror. Evelyn looks queasy, hugging Tyki tighter, and Tyki's eyes have narrowed to golden slits.

Cross gives a bemused smile. "And then it shot me." In the blunt silence afterwards, he laughs, but not mirth-filled like he did in the White Ark, but bitter and pained. His curtain of flaming hair shivers as he shakes his head, turning back to the yellow glow of the coals. "When the blued bullet, the work of my own hands, grazed my face, cracking my mask, I felt my Innocence turn on me." His glaze glints, reflecting the yellowed chasms in the coal. "Needless to say…it hurt."

"How did you get away?" Tyki's question surprises Evelyn, and she twists around to see him smile grimly.

"The bullet shattered the window behind me. I simply leaned back and fell out, letting Maria catch me with her song. She shielded me from Apocryphos afterwards." Cross runs a gloved hand through his hair, and Allen is aware, for the first time, how tired his master looks. "Fortunately, my superior intellect and excellent skills as an alchemist allowed for a full recovery. Maria is shielding this house from it at the moment."

"Why didn't you contact us?"

"Because Apocryphos would have realised your importance, Bakadeshi," Cross says dryly, "and came after you. You are the most important thing to the Order right now." In the awkward atmosphere after, he sighs and drawls, "Why do I always have to explain things to you, idiot?"

Allen is too surprised to utter a word. Instead he simply stares at his master, gratitude shining unbidden from his grey eyes. Seeing this, Cross harrumphs, sticks a boot onto the chair opposite him, stretching out his lean legs. "Right," he says briskly. "Now, Curly-hair, teach my stupid apprentice how to control his Noah properly."

Tyki begins to smile at the brusqueness of these words. He slowly turns to Allen, wicked grin spreading.

"What?" Allen squeaks. "Now?"

Cross snarls in annoyance, "Yes, now. I once did not care whether you incinerated once Nea awoke, but now I see that you have to live."

"Why me?" Allen returns, voice rising almost to a shout. "I know you couldn't care less about the Fourteenth, but why am I so important to you?"

Tyki's quiet voice cuts across the fray. "Ah," he murmurs, staring into the distance. "I understand now." In a dry tone, he says to Allen, "You are a bizarre twist of fate, my friend." Evelyn, leaning against his shoulder, starts as her violet eyes fill with understanding and pity.

"What can I possibly have which is useful to the Order? In fact, if I turn Noah, I'll kill you all!" Allen yells at the room at large, jumping to his feet.

Tyki returns plainly, "Because you have the Heart Innocence."

Allen is shocked into silence.

"What were the chances that Nea would be reborn into the Exorcist with the Heart?" Tyki continues, sounding a low whistle. "You are unique."

Allen gazes at Evelyn, who nods, a bittersweet, fragile smile on her features. _I'm sorry,_ she seems to say. Cross glares at Allen, on his feet now, stalks over, and cuffs his apprentice around the ear, knocking him out of his daze. "Apocryphos lives solely to protect the Heart Innocence. He has also stated that his next aim is to _absorb you._" Cross's intense slit-eyed stare stabs at Allen as Allen rubs his ear, blinking. "Try and get some thinking through that thick skull of yours. What could that _possibly mean_?"

Allen swallows and sinks back into the sofa, the breath escaping him and his limbs turning into jelly. "But…if I have the Heart, that means…" he says quietly, looking desperate.

"Yes," Cross says in a voice of steel. "If you don't gain control of your Noah, your Noah may well crush your Innocence."

(:~:)

Dripping sugary sweetness, a voice sounds out in the infinite reaches of the Black Ark, "Sheril, how goes it?"

"Very well indeed, Millennium Earl," is the answer, harsh yet eloquent, like jagged metal polished with oil.

"Can we control her once _this_," – pudgy fingers stroke white surface unknown – "is complete?"

"Supreme control. I will be directing it to its target," Sheril answers easily.

"Excellent," the Millennium Earl breathes, the frigid, dank air of the Ark filling him. "But there is just one problem."

A pause. "And what might that be?" Sheril inquires.

"Where, dear Sheril, is your brother?"

"I don't know."

(:~:)

Allen shudders against the bindings that secure his arms and legs to the simple wooden chair. His hair drips with sweat and the air seems to congeal, making it harder to breathe. "This…sucks…," he manages through gasping breaths.

"It's not pretty," Tyki agrees, once more crouched in front of Allen. "Can you feel the Noah surfacing now?"

"It's…_clawing_ its way to the surface…with freezing claws…"

"Naturally." Tyki's golden gaze is unperturbed. In a perfectly cool voice, he continues, "Now, do what I told you before. Allow your Innocence to flow into your veins, and melt the ice of the Noah."

"Can't," Allen moans, eyes squeezed shut.

Leaning against the fireplace, Cross unravels his lanky arms and stomps toward Allen. Shoving Tyki unceremoniously aside, he whacks Allen about the face again. Evelyn leans forward from the sofa, hand outreached, but stops when she hears Cross's low words, "Bakadeshi. You're not accessing the full power of the Heart. There's no use synchronising with it. You must let it overwhelm you until every part of you is humming with it."

"It burns," Allen groans. "I can't direct it. What's…the use…of controlling the Noah…with something I can't control?"

Here, Tyki steps forward once more and says, more forcefully this time, "Let your memories of your Nakama direct you and help you. Bind the Noah with your Innocence, and rework your Innocence with those you hold most dear." He glances at Evelyn to find the same half-smile as his playing her lips.

Allen gasps, and the world shudders black and white. Dimly, he hears someone shout his name.

(:~:)

Bound to the selfsame chair, Allen opens his eyes to find a wintry wasteland, snow fluttering about him like the ashes from a fire, the burning stars jewels in forked hair of the snow-laden trees. And standing in front of him, with his head tilted at a jaunty angle, is Nea Walker. Unlike the previous time, Nea wears a long black frockcoat, like Allen's. Something unreadable passes through his young face.

"Allen," he says, as a friend says to another, "Why do you run from me?"

"You wish to change me, make me something that I am not." Allen replies, surprised to hear his voice ring clear and true.

Nea sighs, and gives a light laugh that calls of springtime with breezy shadows and places of rest. "I cannot _change_ you, Allen," Nea says quietly. "I can only make you understand yourself. Will you allow me to do this, Allen?"

"No," Allen says defiantly, fire flaring in his grey eyes, as grey as the winter around them. He knows to Cross and the others, he must be slowly slipping into unconsciousness. Some small part of him know this is not good.

Then a sharp spike of purple lightning seems to arch down the black sky, lighting up the world for an instant with an amethyst glow. Then, looking at Nea, Allen understands what to do. Warmth spreads out from his chest, loosening his frozen fingers, releasing the bonds around his limbs. Fluidly, he stands, facing Nea in the waste of the Fourteenth's dreams. As he looks at Nea, he sees the Noah of Destruction, but he also sees a young man, smiling a world-wearied smile. Suddenly, Allen sees; he sees Nea as a boy, laughing as he ran through fields of barley, Mana sharing in his joy. Something within Allen, a residue of Mana, recognizes and trembles at this.

Unbidden, memories of his Nakama spring into his vision. Lenalee, Lavi, Kanda and Krory, Evelyn and Marie, Miranda and Chaoji, Komui, Reever, Johnny, even Link. Some recollections are full of laughter, some hold tears, and some are simply…there. And all are so precious to him. Caressing these treasured jewels of memories, Allen looks up at Nea.

Nea nods, seeming to be satisfied at last.

Motes of pure light, voices and faces of his Nakama, twirl out of him and about Nea, and the heat in his heart increases, filling him with unfathomable power. He feels so…_alive_. Stretching out a trembling hand, his left hand, he touches the tip of his finger over Nea's heart. Nea dips his head in farewell as the motes of light surround him and obscure him from view. Already, the stars in the night sky are humming, and Allen realises with joy that each is a sphere of Innocence, spread over the world. He sees them here in dreamscape, and can find them in reality.

The light vanishes, leaving darkness, but not a fearful one. Instead, it is one which is warm and comforting and simply lulls him to sleep.

(:~:)

Evelyn chokes back a breath as she removes her hands from Allen's forehead, Acumen forming gloves over her bandages. The things she had seen in Allen's mind both shocks her and yet, seems fitting. At Cross's and Tyki's unspoken question, she nods tiredly before crumpling to the floor, not an ounce of energy left in her.

With barely a glance at Allen, Tyki carries her outside to the little garden, hoping the sun will seep into her. Cross crouches down beside Allen, watching his fitful breathing turn slow and steady. And then Allen murmurs quietly in his sleep, "Master, did you pile up debts again? Don't worry, I'll work them off for you."

As Cross is alone, he allows a small smile at this to flit across his face, and settles down in an armchair opposite Allen to wait.

(:~:)

Outside the window, Mother sees his silent vigil, and snorts to herself, "Hypocrite. So, you didn't care if he lives or dies, eh? Liar." Mother carries yet another tray of tea to an elegant metal table under the half-shade of a roof of vines. Evelyn is slumped in a chair, too weak to do anything but allow the sun to caress her face. Tyki slouches, elegantly somehow, on the wicker chair by her, booted feet resting on the spindly wrought-iron table. As Mother deposits the tray on the table, she slaps at Tyki's boots with a short growl, and Tyki's cocky grin flashes as he slides his feet off the table.

Wordlessly muttering to herself, Mother goes in search of wine. But a genuine smile graces her wrinkled face.

Under the covering of the vines, Tyki watches the sunlit lane that runs behind Mother's house, curving around a lake. He examines the townspeople and travelers, each going about their own business, not seeing him because of the barely visible blue energy shield surrounding the house. Maria has done her job well.

Then suddenly, Tyki sits up, startled, and his hands grip the rests of his chair, knuckles turning white. "Eeez," he murmurs, care finding its way into his wondering voice.

Evelyn turns a questioning gaze upon him as he stares at the little boy walk up the lane, his face obscured by a medical mask, eyes bright. Behind him, two men, workers, lanky and coarse, are laughing at some previous poker game as they let their feet carry them up the walk. Tyki says in a voice not his own, "They were my friends. I...said goodbye to them when I turned away from the Noah and pledged to help the Order."

Evelyn reaches out and places a warm hand on his. _Go greet them,_ she tells him silently.

"I can't," he murmurs. "If I go outside the curtain, Apocryphos can sense me." He gazes after Eeez, who is chasing an errant butterfly. "He looks happy. They'll take care of him." It is with an empty heart that Tyki watches his old friends laugh in the sunlight, letting their steps lead them to find work and rest, free from the life that Tyki so desperately wants to escape. They round the corner and are gone.

In a dry, cracking voice, like wind chimes being cleaned of rust, Evelyn manages a quiet, "You are free with me, Tyki."

He looks at her, startled. Her voice is coarse from disuse, but retains the wit that so attracts him. "Thank you," he whispers, "for understanding." _How strange, but fitting,_ Tyki thinks,_ that we do not need to speak to understand one another._

After a while in the warm sun, with the green of the garden around them and the humming bees in the bushes, Tyki carries Evelyn back to the house, no more words said.

(:~:)

In the afternoon light, Allen awakes to find himself lying on the sofa, an old blanket tucked around him. Everything seems to dart out at him in sharp clarity, and he _senses_ three pinpricks of power in the world around him, two humming with Innocence, one with melancholy chords of music, underlain with darkness.

"So, you've elected to wake up, Bakadeshi," Cross booms to his left. Swiveling his neck, Allen sees his master stretch from his chain beside the fireplace, holding his cigarette to release a thin stream of smoke from between his lips. "Took you long enough, lazy sod."

Allen says nothing, gazing at his master with a wonder in his eyes, sitting up. Cross narrows his eyes at this. "What do you see?" he hisses.

Allen swallows. The world through his right eye is as normal as ever, but to his left… Even though his left eye is not activated, he sees Cross's power as a sparkling shell of light surrounding him, bathing him in a warm glow of azure. He sees Cross's link to Maria's barrier around the house, like a current of dust motes. And he can see the gaping wound were Judgement should be, like a darker patch of navy in a sea of cerulean.

"You're wounded, Master," Allen whispers.

Cross stirs uneasily. "I'm perfectly healthy," he growls.

"No," Allen breathes, eyes widening. "Your connection with your Innocence is."

As Cross takes a step back in shock, Tyki steps in, setting Evelyn down in a chair, and stops at the strange look Allen gives the two of them. "What?" he asks uncertainly.

Evelyn smiles gently, and says, her voice slowly losing its rust, "You can see my Innocence and his Noah, right?"

A spike of fear sends ice into Tyki's veins.

Allen nods. "You've bound it well," he murmurs to Tyki. For he sees Tyki as he appears to the others, a young man with curly hair and golden eyes, but his heart is shrouded sable against the pure white of his shirt. Surrounding the dark creature inside him are thousands upon thousands of fine silver chains, edged with amethyst, resonating a pure melody that has the Noah shrinking back in fear.

Evelyn's aura of Innocence is clearer than Cross's, whole and glittering and filled with youth, and strangely, exudes wisdom. As if she could understand anything.

"Thank you for helping me," Allen grins at Evelyn.

"You're welcome," she smiles in return.

Allen nods, somehow looking more world-wise and mature than a sixteen-year old should ever be. Then the calmly rises and walks over to his master. "Master," he says, "Do you want Judgement back?"

Cross's left eye widens, and in Allen's clear grey eyes, he sees a faded reflection of himself, surrounded by his power. He doesn't speak. But Allen hears the answer well enough. Looking straight into his master's gaze, no longer the hesitant apprentice or the wandering clown, Allen laughs and says simply, _"Activate."_

Immediately, Crown Clown activates on his shoulders, but it is no longer the stark white of before. Instead, a slivery-grey cloak surrounds him, and the silver-filigreed mask on his back is rimmed with amethyst dark matter. _Noah and Exorcist._ His left hand is the same as ever, glowing with Innocence in the sharp fingers. Holding out his left hand between him and Cross, Allen builds his power, conjuring a shimmering image of a glowing heart surrounded by jeweled spikes over his hand.

"The Heart…" breathes Evelyn, her voice soft once more. Tim darts up out of nowhere and lands on her shoulder, watching the proceedings curiously.

The image flits over to Cross's chest, stopping over his heart, causing the spot to shine with a blinding white light. Cross's face, hopeful, stern, is ridged with shadows. Then Tyki senses a sharp spike in a strangely familiar music, and Evelyn hears Acumen whisper in her mind, "_And so the boy falls asleep…"_

An impossibility streaks down from the ceiling, a white-patched lightning bolt, to hover above Allen's hand. An Ark Gate. Cross staggers as it simply slips around Maria's shield. Something ripples in the gate, and from the blank, opaque depths of the milky-white gate, something drops into Allen's hand.

Cross stares down at Judgment, whole, polished, and deadly beautiful. The image of the heart pulses over his chest, and Judgement flares in a burst of light that surpasses the brightness of the sun even as the stars surpass the shine of diamonds.

The light vanishes abruptly. Only the Ark gate remains, above Allen's palm.

Cross reaches forward with a barely disguised tremble and picks up his weapon, feeling its power once more. For a moment, he seems unable to form words. "Thank you, Allen," he murmurs. It is the first time Cross has ever spoken his name without berating him somehow.

"You're very much welcome, master," Allen grins, the same smile he always shared with his friends. "Now–"

Allen frowns.

"What?" Tyki asks.

From the misty Ark Gate, a blood-lined white hand reaches out for Allen's face. Evelyn squeaks with fear. Allen steps back smartly, leaving the gate suspended, and whispers, _"Obey me."_

Apocryphos's hand stops, and it seems to hesitate. Allen continues flawlessly, _"I am the wielder of the Heart, and I order you to protect it by leaving the Order alone, and remaining in the Ark until I tell you otherwise."_ A pause; then Apocryphos calmly withdraws its hand and the Ark Gate closes with a flash of ozone.

In the thick silence afterwards, Mother stomps in, takes one look at the three people staring stunned at Allen, and pulls Allen into a bear hug. "I knew you could do it, Allen," she says warmly. Allen blushes beetroot and deactivates dark matter and Innocence, once more dressed in plain black. But the Rose Cross on his chest glints in the sunlight. Timcampy flies over and rests in his silver hair again.

Cross holsters Judgement moodily. "Oh, who could have known," he says in a voice dripping with sarcasm. "Mother has a heart. I could faint with– AARGH!" The rest of his words are stopped by Mother's surprisingly accurate stomp on his foot. Tyki and Evelyn sit back to watch the show as Cross leaps around the room like a startled monkey, howling over his boot as his red hair leaps up into spikes.

(:~:)

In the hour afterwards, things are settled surprisingly quickly. Cross is to go back to the Order, Evelyn accompanying him. Tyki is about to return to the Black Ark, but Allen stays silent.

"Where will you go, Allen?" Evelyn asks. She had pushed off Mother's reprimands at speaking without her confirmation that her voice had healed. But it didn't matter, as her voice is back to sounding like wind chimes.

Allen grins darkly. "With Tyki to the Black Ark." Over on the other side of the room, Tyki's light laughter begins to sound, but not in ridicule. In agreement. Cross doesn't object either, only stops in his preparations to stare at Allen hard. Allen continues, "We could use two pairs of eyes in the Noah."

"But won't they realise…" Evelyn murmurs.

"All I need to do is turn grey and wave some dark matter. It'll be a walkover," Allen says with a small smile. He unpins the Rose Cross from his chest and slides it into his pocket.

Evelyn looks hesitant, but simply gives Allen and goodbye hug as Cross grunts a farewell and stalks throught he Ark gate Allen had conjured. Tyki steps forward to kiss Evelyn farewell. When the gate has closed behind them, Tyki and Allen take their leave of Mother and Barba and walk to the quiet lane outside. The deepening twilight is perfectly still as they let their skin wash with grey. Tyki taps a plane of air, allowing it to solidify into blackness, and leads Allen through with one last look of worry.

On the other side, he calls to the room at large, "Look who I brought home."

Twelve Noah stare at them, eyes wide, the Earl's expression unreadable. "Welcome, Brothers," Sheril says, narrowing his gaze. Road begins to laugh with joy, flouncing forward.

Allen steels himself, looks at the faces of abhorred Noah, and lets a dark grin spread on his grey face, answering, _"I'm home, brothers and sisters."_

The Noah family is complete.

**Ciffie enough for you? Oooooo. Hehe. Sorry. Couldn't resist. I like being evilly unpredictable. It rocks. Next time, circles within circles. See you next week.**


	5. Allies

**Hey. I do some serious plot building in this chapter. This should be fun, because the variables are escalating, and everyone seeks to use the war for their own gain. I don't own D Gray-man or any of its characters, only OCs.**

**NarikoKaori, Kira 440: Thank you for favouriting, and I hope you like this chapter!**

_If the world were a mirrored pool,_

_And all humans as rain fell,_

_Ripples would spread in conflicting circles_

_And disharmony resounds from hell._

(:~:)

The first words that come out of Evelyn's mouth that fine morning are rather strange. As she speaks, she wonders slightly at exactly how crazy her life must be getting if she feels perfectly normal voicing these words.

"Are you stalking me?" she calls airily down the corridor.

From an alcove velvet-curtained with sable, Howard Link's gold plait flashes as he steps into the pool of sunlight. "Do you think I am, Miss Merle?" he counters. He remains in full traveller's harness, despite being safe within the walls of the Order. The light glances off his array of weapons, not counting the ones hidden, both in his jacket and in his mind, one in his heart…

"Why, Link, asking me for an opinion?" Evelyn grins momentarily, halting her slow pace, wincing as her healing injuries twinge. She slides into a padded seat in the warmth by a window. "Since when have you ever done that?"

"Could we stop having a conversation by questions, please?" Link says, coming over. Evelyn raises an eyebrow. Link winces, continuing quickly, "Oh. Right. Sorry."

"You've hidden quite well," Evelyn says, tilting her head to examine him in the bright luminence from the window behind her. "You're still in full fighting harness and coat, I see."

"It was easy to slip away after entering the cafeteria," Link returns. "Only Lenalee truly recognised me. To the other science department members, I was only ever a name, not a face. Lavi probably told her not to reveal my existence."

"Komui should know," Evelyn breaks in.

He glances at her, then gives a dark smile and answers plainly, "Well, I can't stop you from telling him if you want to."

"There's no point keeping you a secret when the last battle is but a dawn away," Evelyn murmurs, "And now I sound like my grandmother."

"We never know whether anything is it's last." Link sighs, muttering, "This is an interesting conversation, but I must be gone, Evie." Evelyn registers his use of her nickname with a grin.

As he strides away, Evelyn calls lightly after him, "_I must be gone?_ Can't you at least speak colloquially?" She sees his quickly hidden smile flash around the corner; then he slips into the hidden ways again. Evelyn leans against the warm panes of glass, watching the azure arch above scatter with wisps of cloud. Disgustingly fluffy. Vilely perfect. She could barf with the natural _picturesqueness_ of it all. Ugh. _Bored._

A low voice sounds by her ear, "Did Link say anything of consequence?"

Evelyn silently toasts her training for her not jumping up like a startled river-bird and whacking the person behind unconscious. "I seem to recall telling you repeatedly not to do that," she growls as she turns.

Kanda shrugs, a mere movement of his shoulders, sending his full-length black coat swinging about his feet, letting the sunlight dance off a dagger in his boot. "I say the same to Lavi for many things." His dark eyes flick to her hands. "How are your injuries healing?"

Evelyn's dry smile spreads. "As I have said to you every time you've asked: Well enough." She makes to stand up, but is unable to hide the tremble in her fingers as her hands push against the casement. Kanda steadies her, and supports her weight with his arm as she wavers on her feet. Evelyn is silent as she begins to slowly make her way towards Komui's office, leaning on Kanda's arm. Kanda, as usual, doesn't speak.

He feels her take a breath, in preparation for her words. He closes his eyes for a moment, shutting out what he knows is about to come. "Please." The pleading word darts out of him before he can stop himself. "I've never begged for anything before."

"Yuu," Evelyn sighs, stopping and turning to him with far more grace than her injuries should allow. Her eyes are filled with gentle pity. "You're wonderful, you know? I've never–"

"Don't. I'm not." Kanda says forcefully, staring at the bleak grey stones of the wall.

Evelyn's hand is in his now. "Yuu. Look at me."

Kanda turns desolate dark eyes to meet liquid violet ones. She becomes aware much taller he is now. A year ago, he was closer to her in height.

"You're one of the most loveable guys I know," Evelyn says. "And a far better man than what most of the Order thinks of you." At this, Kanda laughs bitterly and turns away. Evelyn continues, staring intensely at him, "You care for your friends, even if you don't admit it. And I love you," – Kanda looks up sharply – "as a brother," Evelyn finishes. Kanda's sags, as if all his soul has drained out of him, leaving him an empty husk for a heart.

A hoarse chuckle escapes him. "So I'm getting dumped, Evie?" Kanda desperately wants to hold her hand tightly, but his worry for her injuries overrules it.

"Yuu, We were never together in the first place," Evelyn says. "You're an elder apprentice. My older brother, almost." A wry smile twists her lips. "Although you _are_ technically younger than me."

"A year, nothing more," Kanda whispers. "But what's to become of us?"

"We go our ways in the Order," Evelyn answers, pity wrenching her heart. "And remain friends. Could you do that for me?"

"I don't know," Kanda breathes, stepping away. "I doubt it."

"You've kept all this inside you for the longest time, Yuu, for fear of confusing me," Evelyn reaches forward for his hand again. "But I'm not supposed to be with you."

"How could you know that?" Kanda chokes.

"Because I'm not _someone_," Evelyn answers, eyes flashing. "And you could never be perfectly happy with me."

"But I would be happy. At least for most of my life," Kanda says. "Look at Lavi and Lenalee. I never thought I would say this, but I…envy them. You make me actually like being alive, and I wouldn't die feeling like I existed for nothing!"

"Yuu, no," Evelyn shakes her head, dark hair swinging in a circle, her expression looking perilously fragile. "You mean a lot to us, your nakama. Find something to live for."

Pleading, Kanda gazes down at her. "But living without you, Evie…"

"Yuu!" Evelyn nearly yells, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him. Looking directly into his eyes, speaking with the weight of the world in every word, she says, "I…will…be…there. To support you. As your nakama."

Kanda nods slowly. He has no more to say. His eyes look wet.

Seeing this, Evelyn stands up on the tips of her toes to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you, Yuu," she whispers, and gives him a quick hug. He returns it instantly, embracing her tightly.

They continue down the corridor, Evelyn with her arm through Kanda's for support, and Kanda dreading the moment she will be gone from his side.

(:~:)

Tyki climbs the last few flights of steps, lithe limbs moving with casual grace, the white ends of his full-length, long-sleeved white coat flapping about his sable boots. Soft yellow light from the lamps on the wall pool around his feet like liquid gold Through a narrow door at the top is a short, round space, a wide banister, then a sharp drop into the inky blackness below.

"Road's got to you, hasn't she?" he calls into the wind.

The solitary figure of pure white raises his head, silver locks gleaming in the gloom. A small smile. "She's…clingy."

"She is. It took me half an hour to escape her," Tyki grins in return. "How did you find this place?"

"Followed any path up," Allen murmurs, staring out at the dark city. "It takes some getting used to, this…_presence _in my head."

"Like a prelude to a nightmare, playing over and over," Tyki answers. Allen remains silent. He notices how Allen's hands cradle a black-and-white diamond-checkered stack. "You've still got that pack of cards, then?" Tyki exclaims. "The last time I saw those–" He grinds to a halt as he realises what he did to Allen the last time he had held those cards.

"I don't mind," Allen says, tilting his head at him. In the shadows, his jagged scar is less visible, enough that Allen seems to have the normal face of a sixteen-year-old, without the troubles of war and death. The truth is far from it. "It reminds me of a well-played game of poker."

"Well played on your part and idiotically on mine," Tyki chuckles. "That was the first time I underestimated you. You might be happy that I did. You're alive because of it." He leans comfortably against a pillar, hands in his pockets. The weak lamplight casts them both in half-shadow.

"We could have been friends, you know," Allen murmurs, flipping his cards into a blurred column between his gloved hands. "That was what I thought as you threw these to me from the platform."

"We still could be," Tyki says, absentmindedly picking at his sleeve. Allen nods slowly.

"I was thinking…" Allen begins hesitantly.

"Bad start," Tyki breaks in, with humour in his voice.

"You've been spending too much time with Evie," Allen rolls his eyes. "Your tongue is as silvered as hers is." Then he sits up straighter and his tone becomes serious. "Talking about the cards make me realise something. Every pack of cards have two Jokers, right?"

"Yes…" Tyki answers, unsure where this is going.

Allen's next words are deathly powerful. "So where are they in Acumen? I have only ever counted fifty-two cards."

Tyki takes his hands out of his pockets, shivering a little in the fell air as he crosses his arms and stares at the ground. His golden eyes are inscrutable. "Most…intriguing, " he whispers. "Is it possible she has never activated the Jokers before? Their possibilities…"

"Maybe…" Allen wonders, "They only come when she pushes her Innocence past a breaking point."

"Perhaps," Tyki murmurs. Then he shifts uneasily and says, "But that's not important right now."

"What?" Allen asks warily.

"It's time to tell you about the music score for the Ark." Seeing Allen's darkening expression, Tyki simply stares at him unwaveringly until Allen sighs and dips his head. Tyki nods and begins. "You invented those symbols with Mana, didn't you?"

"Yes. It was a child's game, nothing more," Allen says, as if every word causes him pain. "Creating a language with nothing but our imagination, scratching them in the snow."

"Mana knew you were…special," Tyki says, regretting the harshness of his words. "He let _you_ write those symbols, because he needed you to understand who you are."

Allen chuckles hollowly. "No. _Mana_ created some of the symbols, too."

Tyki stares coolly at Allen, his face nearly hidden in the shadow of his high collar. Effortlessly, he continues his point. "He only wrote what he knew you already held deep within you." By now, understanding, but not acceptance, is simmering in Allen's grey eyes. Tyki says, "Each symbol you etched into the snow came from the depths of your Noah. It didn't invoke, but it must have slumbered. Nea made those symbols, and so you recognised them."

"So…Mana _wanted_ my Noah to awaken?" Allen murmurs, rejection entering his breathless words. "How…he knew how happy I was. Why would he want to do that to me?"

"You really _are_ a beansprout, aren't you, Woyashi?" Tyki groans, rubbing his eyes with the back of a elegant hand. "Can't you see? He knew he couldn't stop Neah from slowly taking over you. He was _preparing_ you, throughout the time that you were with him, for the Noah's awakening."

Allen hugs his knees to his chest, his white coat flowing around him, staring at the black surface of his boots. Then his gaze softens and he sighs, "I…I just wish I could have spent longer with him."

"That _is_ understandable," Tyki chuckles. "After being taken care of by Mana, I can only imagine what it would be like if Cross picked you up." He makes a face. "How did you possibly survive with that drunken maniac?"

This prompts a real smile from Allen, and the soft answer: "Poker."

Tyki begins to laugh.

(:~:)

Komui is brooding. The grimness carved around the lines of his mouth has sent even Reever scurrying. Lenalee had brought him his coffee, but it sits untouched in bunny-cup, the gaudily grinning rabbit almost laughing at him as its contents turn thin and cold. At the moment, Komui probably thinks he looks supremely indifferent and intelligent in his deep-thought gesture, hunched over his desk, glaring at the opposite wall through the arches of this fingers. In reality, he just looks constipated.

No matter what he does, Komui cannot shake off the feeling of foreboding weighing heavily upon him ever since Evelyn had informed him of Link's survival, like the first beats of the drums before war. Even the bookshelves seem darker around him. _Pathetic_ pathetic fallacy.

Then urgent summons from the infirmary drive the melancholy thoughts from his mind.

(:~:)

By the time Evelyn has hurried into the infirmary, Lavi has already upended the vase of flowers at his bedside and is struggling against the restraints tying his wrists and ankles to his bed. A little further down the ward, Chaojii is doing the same. Both of them are covered in sweat, their pupils dilated, breathing strained. The head nurse, Komui, Lenalee, and the other Exorcists are all gathered there.

"What's going on?" Evelyn exclaims in horror, watching Komui hug a shaking Lenalee as Lavi howls in agony next to them.

Kanda slips through the gathering crowd, his left hand clenched around the hilt of Mugen. "Fiidora," he snarls, dark eyes blazing with uncontrolled fury. "Parasites."

Reever rushes over, saying breathlessly, "Lavi and Chaojii seem to have been infected by parasites, without their knowing." He glances at the curtained corner of the ward where Bookman lies, silently listening to his grandson's screams. "Bookman was…confused after his torture. He only remembered what happened to Lavi after Lavi began to thrash."

"How do we get the parasites out?" Krory growls from behind Evelyn, baring his teeth in a feral expression.

"I don't know," Reever sighs, blond hair wilting as he runs a hand through it. "From what we see, they're not normal parasites. They…respond somehow to our scans–"

Evelyn sucks in a breath. "STOP!" she yells to the room in general. As everyone's gazes turn to her, she shuts her eyes, composes herself, and says carefully, "Did anyone mention our outside _source_ in front of Chaojii?" By _source_, everyone understands she means Tyki.

"I don't think so," Tiedoll returns, equally as carefully. Cross snorts in a corner, making to light a cigarette, before the head nurse slaps it away.

"Good," Evelyn sighs. "Because I think the Noah are using the parasites to spy on us."

"Is that even possible?" Klaud murmurs from next to Timothy.

"Of course." The voice makes them all turn towards the door. Link looks at Lavi and Chaojii with an inscrutable expression as he strides into the room. "I have seen this happen to people I worked with before," he says harshly. His gaze slides to Lenalee's tear-filled eyes. "And I'm afraid there is no cure."

As the room stares at Link in shocked silence, Lenalee's sight never leaves Lavi, who has collapsed, panting with exhaustion, back into his blankets, parched lips cracked, a sheen of sweat on his skin. "There must be a cure," Lenalee whispers.

Evelyn suddenly starts toward the huge cupboard by the wall, moving gracefully despite the limp in her step. "There may be one, but you'll have to trust me." When she turns back to face the others, Lavi's hammer, crimson and shining, is in one hand. In the other rests a scalpel. "Here we go," Evelyn grins, her dangerous laughter dancing like wind chimes. "Quick surgery."

Cross cracks a smile as Komui's eyes widen.

As Evelyn strides over to Lavi, Komui goes to stop her, and Lenalee reaches out and grabs his sleeve. "Nii-san," she pleads, her shoulder-length dark hair swinging about her tear-streaked cheeks. "Let Evie do this. She understands Lavi." Straightening, she fixes a steely gaze on Evelyn and nods.

Evelyn extends the scalpel, and before anyone can say anything, cuts a gash in Lavi's right palm, where a stigma from where the crystal-typed marks his skin. Sluggishly, scarlet blood seeps out from the shallow wound, staining the white sheets. Lavi hisses, his single green eye blinking frantically. Not perturbed in the slightest by the gush of red, Evelyn thrusts Lavi's hammer into his hand, wrapping this slick fingers tight around the cylinder.

Lavi arches his back and screams. The room watches, some in horror, some in passive silence. Bookman parts the curtains around his bed, his old eyes betraying nothing. Bright white light spills out from between Lavi's fingers, and over his yells, Evelyn thinks she hears the insane howl of creatures crisping, shrieking to a level of exquisite agony no human can ever respond to, shrieking because they have never _needed_ to feel pain. The light rushes over all, turning Evelyn's face into a maze of shadows, her violet eyes dark. Tim, nestled in Cross's hair, buries himself deeper. For a moment, the room is filled in white light so blinding, it seems like the Exorcists' shadows are dancing. Then all sounds cease, and Evelyn unclenches Lavi's fingers from the hammer, holding his hand palm-down over the hospital floor.

Grey dust, small and fine, pours out of the cut, forming a small mound on the clean white tiles. Then the cut seals and disappears. Evelyn sighs with relief, and puts Lavi's hand into Lenalee's. "Call him," she says.

"Lavi?" Lenalee says hesitantly, interlacing her fingers with Lavi's limp ones, stroking strands of red hair off his forehead with her other hand. "Please, wake up. We're worried about you." The tenderness in her voice stops Komui's words in his throat. He stares at her and Lavi, finally understanding. "He's not waking!" Lenalee sobs, turning to Evelyn. "Why isn't he waking?"

A voice, weak but laughing, asks, "What are you all doing here? I didn't know you cared."

Lenalee turns back to find Lavi's smiling green eye blinking at her, and a tired grin upon his face. "Lavi…" she whispers, joy and relief mixing on her face. Lavi cocks his head at her. He thinks she has never looked so beautiful in her life. Then he grunts as Lenalee throws her arms around him and begins to sob.

"Well, I knew _you_ cared," Lavi murmurs as he returns her hug weakly. "Why are you all staring at me like that? Have I grown an extra limb or something?"

At this, everyone stops staring at Lavi and stares at Evelyn instead.

She rolls her eyes. "You're all idiots. Lavi's crystal-type is connected to his blood. All I needed to do was allow the Innocence to invoke, and it's goodbye to the parasites. Are you all thicker than you look?"

"Why didn't we think of that?" Reever says as he pokes the pile of dead parasites with a pair of tweezers.

"Because you _are_ thicker than you look," Evelyn says flippantly, flashing him a bright smile. "But only slightly."

"What about Chaojii?" Tiedoll asks. "What's going to happen to my student?" Chaojii twitches, his wild eyes darting about as the parasites take over.

Evelyn frowns. "This could be more difficult. I've never read him with Acumen before, and he hasn't crystal-typed yet…but I could try, Master Teddy." At his nod, Evelyn steps forward, sinking into a stance by Chaojii's bedside. Seeing this, Chaojii begins to thrash, as if the parasites inside him know what is coming.

A tingle runs through Evelyn's fingertips, and with a flutter of thick, crackling paper, Acumen flows from her hands, the gloves melding into cards. Twin bands of red leather around her wrists are all that remains. Transcendent and shining, Acumen arcs down to Chaojii's forehead, where the Ace of Spades flares with ethereal light. "Chaojii," Evelyn whispers. And with a darting bolt of lightning, Evelyn reads Chaojii like a book.

In the many-layered pages of Chaojii's mind, Evelyn sees multitudes. She sees the pain of Anita's passing, still not fully erased, how he treasures his friends, and his joy at being an Exorcist, someone with power. As Evelyn senses the parasites worming through the rustling parchment of Chaojii's mind, and prepares to destroy them, she tenses. There is something... profoundly _wrong_ in a dark corner of Chaojii's consciousness, a hard nub of pain, bitterness, fury and betrayal. Fear lances through her, but she damps it down, and with a quiet word, sends a burst of power through the parasites.

Evelyn opens her eyes and jumps back to avoid Chaojii's retches as he spews parasite-sick onto the floor. "Welcome back," she says, a false smile on her lips. Chaojii continues to heave as she turns and glides away, catching Tiedoll's sleeve and pulling him with her, even as Acumen reforms into gloves on her hands. As Evelyn turns her head to catch one last glimpse of Chaojii, she sees him send a benevolent glare in her direction, before wiping his face clear of emotions.

Tiedoll laughs as Evelyn pulls him into the corridor. "What're you worried about, Evie? You did excellently back there." Evelyn's steps quicken, and Tiedoll has to hurry to keep up. "Evie?" Tiedoll furrows his brow as he sees the desperation on her face lit for an instant in the glow of a lamp. Their sharp footsteps echo on the stones, as if hurrying them on in fear. Evelyn reaches a plain door, opens it with a smooth movement, looks inside, and leads Tiedoll in. A storeroom. The very same storeroom, in fact, as the one in which Tiedoll first spoke to Kanda about his feelings for Evelyn, many months ago now.

Evelyn lets go of her master's sleeve and turns away, hands flying to her temples. When she is composed, she turns, hiding the tremble in her fingers. The work has been too much on her wounds. "Master Teddy," she begins, speaking clearly and quickly, "This may be hard to believe."

"Whatever you say, I will judge by what I know," Tiedoll replies, noting the hard edge to her voice. A spike of worry plunges into his heart. _When Evie is serious, _he thinks, _I've learnt to listen well._ "Go on."

"Just now," Evelyn hisses, running a bandaged, gloved hand through her hair, "when I was reading Chaojii, I…saw something." Her violet eyes are torn. "He hasn't forgiven Allen."

"For what?" Tiedoll says, frowning.

"For being the Fourteenth. And he thinks Allen defiled Anita's memory when he wanted to save Tyki in the Ark," Evelyn says desperately. "And what's worse, he hates him. Chaojii hates Allen."

"To what extent?"

Evelyn stops, and her voice drops an octave. "Chaojii will kill Allen if he comes back." Tiedoll steps back, shock widening his eyes. Evelyn looks away as she releases her pent-up breath in a short exhalation. "This can't happen now. We can't fall apart on the brink of the last battle."

"But we can't say anything, or we'll sow more discord," Tiedoll murmurs, bowing his head as he sinks onto a crate.

Evelyn's laugh is bitter. "There are too many circles, Master Teddy. Circles _within_ circles. Tyki and Allen have infiltrated the Noah, but their position is precarious at best." She spins, dark hair flying, her boots pacing in confused loops. "Link appears to be working with us, but you and I both know he answers to Leverrier in the end. The rest of us…we can't take the chance of Chaojii thirsting for revenge and jepoardising all of us."

"What do you propose we do, then?" Tiedoll sighs, his eyes sad as he tilts his head at Evelyn.

She drops her arms at this, staring at her boots for the longest while. Then she quietly paces over to Tiedoll and sits next to him on the crate. "I don't know."

Tiedoll pats her shoulder gently. "You're a smart girl, Evie. You'll know what to do when the time comes," he grins through his worry.

"Thank you, Master Teddy," Evelyn whispers.

Outside the storeroom, Kanda straightens and stands, eyes dark, for a while as he processes what he has heard. Then he calmly turns and continues down the corridor, yet another circle in the water of the rippling pool of war.

(:~:)

The moment Allen enters the smooth-floored arena, he is besieged by a mass of spiky blue hair. "Alleeeeen!" Road squeals as she hugs him tightly, squeezing the air out of him.

"Road, please," Allen croaks hoarsely.

A velvet voice sounds behind him. "Road, let him go. You're crushing him." Tyki flashes his trademark half-grin at Road, golden eyes smiling under the line of stigmata on his forehead. He had thought it better not to risk wandering around the Black Ark looking like a human.

Road gives at tinkling laugh and leads Allen to the gloomy centre of the darkened room, where the Millennium Earl waits. The shrouded shadows around them are chilled, as always. Tyki frowns. He understands why the Earl make the Black Ark dark, but he does not fathom how anyone could find it comfortable to live in such dank, freezing conditions. "Millennium Earl," he says respectfully, tilting his head.

Allen raises an eyebrow, but says nothing. One thing he has not done since he entered the Ark is to treat the Earl with any prominence.

The Earl stares at Allen with beady eyes for a few moments, before saying, "My dear Allen, I called you here because I wanted to see the extent of your powers. Everyone is here to see." He stops Allen's exclamation with a raised finger, and claps his pudgy hands together. Immediately, the arena floods with light, illuminating the ten other Noah sitting in the stands, watching with bored expressions. Jadero and Devit are banging each other's heads with pistols.

"Millennium Earl, how exactly are you going to test his powers?" Tyki inquires politely, his handsome face free of any emotion.

"I'm so glad you asked, Tyki-pet!" the Earl enthuses. "I wanted an opponent to compare Allen to, and so _you_ are to fight him, Tyki-pet."

"What?" the childish question drips out of Tyki's lips before he can stop himself. "You want me to…duel him?" Allen stares at the Earl with barely disguised horror.

"Of course, my dears," the Earl oozes. "Unless there was any problem…?" his eyes flash horribly behind his round glasses, and his leer widens impossibly.

"Of course not," Tyki answers quickly.

"Then we shall see. Let's go, Road." The Earl says in a syrupy tone, heading towards the stands. Road grins slyly at Allen, then flounces after him.

Allen stares at Tyki, to find him doing the same to him. Swallowing, Allen tries to make his voice strong. "Shall we?" It comes out more as a squeak.

"Very well," Tyki answers, the gentleman's quiet confirmation.

At opposite ends of the smooth, blurry, mirrored surface of the arena, they face each other, composed. Allen notices with distaste that the ground almost looks identical to the horrid battleground of Edo. He can see Tyki's white-coated figure reflected hazily in the surface, immobile– "ARGH!"

Tyki removes his handful of dark matter from around Allen's neck, raises and eyebrow, and says fluidly, "Well, that wasn't very good, was it?" Humour sparkles in his golden eyes.

Allen snarls and throws Tyki back with a wave of pure darkness. Tyki flips backward gracefully on the pulse of energy, landing crouched low like a sprinter, his white coat flapping about his ankles, head lowered. The wind flows around him, and when it has passed, he calmly looks up and cocks his head at Allen, narrowing his eyes. "Oh," He growls, "_Now_ it's getting real."

"Getting used to losing, are we?" Allen chuckles, tossing dark matter between his fingers. He feels so _energized,_ as if his heart is racing at double-speed. "This is _fun_."

"Well, _boy_," Tyki snarls, "Take this." His fingers move in a circle around him, and electricity sparks between them, forming a loop of crackling, sparkling energy, that charges the air with ozone and lances toward Allen in a streak of amethyst lightning.

Allen whirls and leaps up on a flare of purple-rimmed sable, his white coat-sleeves billowing, trailing streams of dark fire that he whirls over his head and whips toward Tyki in a horizontal column of wrath and unbridled violence. Tyki laughs and dances to the side, takes two quick steps, and with the grace of a dancer, leaps into the air, flipping up and over Allen and scything his boot around in a half-moon, sending a wave of energy rushing at Allen's feet from behind.

Allen cries out as his feet are swept out from under him, the edges of his cloak singed. But without pause, he lands on his hands and flips up with an agile motion – to find Tyki arcing down from above. Allen darts back, but as Tyki lands on one knee, a muffled pulse sounds, and a shockwave ripples out from him, sending the surface of the area resonating, and throws Allen into the air like a rag doll. A crackling retort sounds.

"You're not even trying," Tyki smirks as the waltzes over to Allen and stands in midair, looking down at him as he groans.

"Shut up," Allen moans, turning over and hiding his face with a dirt-smeared sleeve. Tyki drifts closer, and yells as Allen flings a handful of dark matter rimmed with white into his face.

As Tyki is flung across the arena to crash painfully into the floor, his usually immaculate clothes ruffled, he evaluates the impact. "Ow…." He wheezes. "That hurt…" Then his thoughts turn to more important matters. _That wasn't just dark matter_, his thoughts race. _That was Innocence coated._

Allen stares at his hands for a minute, seemingly coming to the same conclusion. Then he pulls on the façade again, striding quietly over and smiling down at Tyki. "Impressed?" he says cockily.

"Only Evelyn could have done that to me," Tyki whispers through the dust, so the others cannot hear him. "Congratulations. You've won the title of most annoying bug."

"You want me to tell her you said that?" Allen grins, offering his hand.

"No. Please don't," Tyki says softly, allowing himself to be helped up.

"And Allen is the victor." The Earl's voice is falsely sugary, but strangely ambivalent. "You have fitted into your new role well, Fourteenth."

Allen and Tyki stand a bit straighter, but say nothing.

The Earl spares Sheril a half-glance before continuing to speak, hands behind his back, lecture-style. "I wanted to see the extent of your powers because the last battle is but a dawn away. I have spoken to you about the Innocence of Understanding."

At this, Tyki hides his jolt. He had thought they would leave Evelyn alone. "You have, Millennium Earl," he says eloquently. "But without the girl…"

"Ah, that's were Sheril has surpassed himself." The Earl pats Sheril on the shoulder. "He has created a new type of Akuma, one that…has your ability, Tyki."

"My ability?" Tyki tries to keep the horror out of his voice.

"We've always known your ability to track others simply by their…_music_, as you once said. "This Akuma reads others' music and uses it against them, and most importantly, already knows that silly little girl's melody. It will simply use it to control the Innocence of Understanding."

"And with the Innocence of Understanding…" Tyki breathes, gold eyes wide.

"The barriers between us and unlimited Akuma will be broken down," the Earl simpers. "And we will have an army. And _you_, Tyki-pet, shall lead that army. Unless you have any objection?" His gaze turns razor-sharp and suspecting.

A pause. "Of course not, Millennium Earl," Tyki answers. "I am always here to serve you." _Oh, no. Please, no._

Tyki sees the selfsame fear that would take him flash in Allen's grey eyes.

(:~:)

Komui smiles as he hands the old man in front of him a cup of tea. "How are you feeling?" he asks gently.

"Very well, supervisor," Bookman returns, comfortable on the sofa in Komui's study. "What were you going to ask me?"

Komui grins. Bookman always got straight to the point. "It's about Allen's sword and the Earl's," he says.

"Ah." Bookman sighs. "You may not want to know this."

"But I need to all the same," Komui says.

"Very well, then," Bookman answers. "Allen's sword is the exact replica of the Earl's, only flipped and forged with Innocence."

"That we know," Komui murmurs.

"Yes," Bookman continues impatiently. "But what you do not know is that if Allen should use dark matter to coat the sword, it could be twice as powerful."

"Using dark matter to fight dark matter?" Komui breathes.

"Dark matter is wily, Komui. It can find the smallest of cracks, and does not ally itself with all of its hosts."

"That's excellent, I'll tell Reever now–"

"Komui, there's something else you need to know." Bookman places his tea on the table. "The relationship between the Fourteenth and Road…"

"What?" Komui exclaims.

"The Fourteenth successfully killed all the Noah except Road and the Millennium Earl," Bookman says. "You know why he couldn't kill them?" his gnarled frown spreads. "Because Road became a little girl, barely eight years old, who threw herself at Nea's knees and begged to live."

Komui listens in rapture.

"Nea hesitated; just for a moment, but he did. And in that moment, the Millennium Earl struck," Bookman sighs. "I was there, watching in the shadows. Some part of Nea was lost then. Lost to Road's dream."

"So Road holds the power to Allen's full invocation of his new powers?" Komui asks in horror.

"Yes. And she is the most cunning of them all."

**Sorry, this may have seemed somewhat like a filler chapter, but I wanted to build all the interested parties in war. Fighting in the next chapter! Please review; I'd like to hear your opinions. Next week, then.**


	6. Identity

**Fighting begins this chapter! But there are some other knots to tie first. Still, fluff, comedy, angst, and action. YAY! I don't own D Gray-Man or any of its characters. I only own OCs.**

**I'm too lazy to log in: Thanks for reviewing!**

**lotusmelody17: Thanks for the encouragement. Please update your story too! Fluff is always brilliant. And no, I don't have a tumblr, though I wish I did. I just don't have the time.**

**Hell Changer, kissesfromkari, theristia, Ghostwhispers, thanks for noticing this story, and enjoy!**

Reever leans forward, tapping his shoes on the floor by the edges of his lab coat, a cup of lemon soda in one hand. He should be working, but the bustling science department members around him do not disturb him. Rather, they hide smiles as they realise his gaze is trained on a picture frame placed centre on his desk. Reever is lost in memory as he remembers the Allen he knew, laughing and quietly serious, a friend. Now that young face with the jagged scar on the left cheek is frozen forever in a shout of laughter, surrounded by the faces of other comrades. Reever sighs and reaches for his communications headset as a shrill beep sounds.

"Section Chief Reever," he groans into the headset. "If it's you, Timothy, messing around with the wires again, I'll personally come and slaughter you."

The quiet voice on the other end of the line replies, _"My apologies, Reever. I'll have to disappoint you."_ Even through the static, the smile can be heard in Allen's voice.

Reever crashes painfully to the floor as he falls off the swivel chair, dragging the headset with him. Rubbing the newly raised lump on his forehead, he waves away the approaching lab-coated people and mouths, "Get the supervisor." James, the young man with a cocky grin, dashes off to find him.

"Allen!" Reever hisses into the microphone, unable to stop a beaming smile from spreading. "How are you able to contact us?"

Allen says, _"We're using Mikky, Evelyn's golem. Tyki held on to it."_ A clattering noise. Through the static, Tyki remarks self-importantly, _"I'm wonderful, aren't I?"_ Reever grins as he hears Allen yell at him to shut up.

"Any news?" Reever asks. "Good or bad, it's still news."

Allen sounds reluctant _"Bad. The Earl's getting rather worked up on a major offensive. And – Reever, try to break it to Evie gently – he's made an Akuma that can use her powers."_

Reever feels as if a cold hand has gripped his spine. "Are you sure? How is that even possible?"

Tyki's voice is cold as it answers quietly, _"The Earl copied my ability to listen to others' music and turn it against them. Tell Evelyn I'm sorry. I don't know how they did it."_ Reever's heart clenches in horror as he hears Tyki continue, _"Hide Evelyn. They must not use the Innocence of Understanding. If they do, then the walls between finding the name of a loved one and the creation of Akuma will be broken down. An army, Reever. An army that the Earl wants me to lead."_

Reever swallows. "We shall take whatever precautions necessary. But what will you and Allen do?" He runs a hand through the spikes of his blonde hair.

The question hangs on the sparking currents of static for the longest while. Then Allen's dry reply: _"Sabotage the Earl's forces as much as we can. But the bulk of the army will not be these Akuma. Most of his army will be made up of new Akuma he intends to create once he has Evie's Innocence."_

"_This is why Evelyn __**must**__ be hidden,"_ Tyki's whisper flows out of the headset. _"I care for her too much."_

Something occurs to Reever that plunges his spirits even further. "But you know what we will have to do. Should she be captured by the Earl's forces, we shall have to attack nonetheless," Reever says in a horrified daze. "And if we should destroy the Akuma playing her music, she may never recover."

Dark and self-loathing comes Tyki's answer. _"I know. But we have no other course of action. Make sure she understands that I only want her to be safe."_

"We will," Reever replies to the empty static as the fragile connection snaps. He leans back in his chair, filled with foreboding purpose.

Komui's reaction is much the same a few minutes later, when Reever explains what they have to do.

(:~:)

Evelyn growls as she hammers on the richly engraved door. "Let me out!" she yells for the umpteenth time, knowing that there will be no answer. "I'm an Exorcist! I'm not going to be locked up in here like some common criminal while the rest of you prepare for war!"

Through the door, the muffled voice of a Finder replies, "We're sorry, Miss Merle, but the supervisor's orders were quite clear."

Evelyn snarls in fury and spins, her right boot sneaking around and striking the door so hard, a pulse of energy sends the lanterns rattling in their sockets. "Filthy orders," she spits. Massaging her aching foot, she slides down the door and into the rich carpet, glaring at the chamber. Admittedly, the room she has been locked in isn't a cell for a _common criminal_. The room is simply and elegantly furnished in tones of white and varying shades of blue, with a soft four-poster in a corner and a huge sofa and mahogany table in the other. Evelyn sits on a soft, deep-pile carpet, clean and comforting, leaning against the prettily wallpapered wall–

–which is also reinforced with two feet of solid steel, the door set within made of hard bronze metal, bolted with six layers of bars needing two sets of identification – Reever and Komui's – guarded by a heavily armed Finder unit, and placed hundreds of metres below the actual order itself, tonnes of rock above.

Such fun and games.

Evelyn snorts, fuming. Whatever comfort she draws from the room is rather ruined by what lies outside the barred door. "Putrid Moron," she mutters under her breath, her violet eyes simmering. "So you told them to _protect me,_ eh? Stupid, self-important, blockheaded…" She continues to defile Tyki's name with every curse she knows until she tires of it. "You care for me too much, Tyki…" Evelyn whispers, fingering the poker chip and cards on the chain on her hip. "Far too much. When this is all over, I'm going to teach you a lesson." Thinking up ways to punish Tyki gives her some solace, at least.

Acumen is still on her hands. They had decided that it was best to leave it with her. Kanda had sat through the deliberations as Tiedoll argued about how to protect her, glaring at the floor. Evelyn had read his expression and quietly fumed when she figured out that he actually agreed with Komui, for once.

"Bakabakabakabaka," Evelyn curses under her breath, banging her head against the cool surface of the door.

(:~:)

"_The preparations are done. All the Exorcists are on alert."_ Komui's voice drifts out of Mikky's silvered speaker.

"How did Evelyn take it?" Tyki groans, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms. Allen had dozed off in an armchair in a corner, and Tyki had been left trying to get Mikky to connect again. His brain hurts, and his curly hair has somehow exploded into a new definition of unruly. It now hangs floppily in front of his golden eyes.

"_Not well,"_ Komui answers. _"I think she wants to murder you when you come back."_ Mikky hovers above Tyki's desk, flapping its wings as it grins, rather like Timcanpy.

This at least brings out a tired smile. "Her exact words?" Tyki asks humourously.

"_Something like: 'Moron's as good as dead.'"_

Tyki sighs as he leans back in his chair and places his boots on the table. "I suppose I deserve that." He cocks his head. "Komui, have you taken precautions to ensure your sister's safety?"

A long, strained pause. _"I can't do that anymore. She's too valuable an Exorcist, and I've learnt from last time not to treat her like a child anymore. If I lock her up, then she'll simply break out. She cannot leave her friends."_

Tyki closes his eyes momentarily. "Will Evelyn do that, you think?" he muses, almost to himself, fingering his ever-present poker chip in his pocket.

"_You know her better than I do."_

Tyki says with a twinge of worry, "I'll send you new intel when it comes."

"_Very well."_ A small click ends the conversation, far too final for their comfort.

(:~:)

In a room of walls so pure a white they seem to glimmer ethereally, the music of the Black Ark swirls and mixes in motes of light and currents of sable, unbearably hot and cold, in an endless whirl that takes the echoes of each room in the Ark and amplifies them, creating dancing melodies, deeply melancholy chords, all forming a chorus of variations in a single, pure harmony.

And in the centre of this extraordinary chamber a solitary figure is seated, cross-legged, hands on knees, raven hair falling over closed eyes as he listens to the whisperings of those around him. His white coat melds into his surroundings, soundless against the mirrored surface. No one in the Ark escapes his attention, and no conversation goes unheard.

Tyki raises his head, eyelids snapping open to reveal golden irises. _Something suspicious in those variations..._ Closing his eyes again, he pushes effortlessly with his mind through the white mists of melody, to where two hazy figures in Noah robes whisper secrets, believing they are unheard.

One of the figures speak threads of silky sound. _"What shall we do with Tyki?"_

Tyki hisses, head bowed. _Sheril._

The other form, pudgy, unmistakable, answers Sheril in sugary tones, _"Turn on him just as the battle begins. That should distract his friends long enough so we can move in on the Innocence of Understanding. It should also test the ties of the Fourteenth."_

"_Will Tyki fall?"_ Sheril's voice echoes with nonchalance.

"_Yes. Does that disturb you?"_ Sugar turned to icy sourness.

A pause. Then Sheril answers fluidly, _"Of course not, Millennium Earl. When do we strike?"_

"_Tomorrow morning. By next evening, the Black Order will be no more,"_ the Millennium Earl, filled with purpose, declares.

Tyki pulls back through the silky, milk-white curtains of notes and melodies, slowly coming back to himself. Then he chokes in a gasping breath and wipes his brow on the back of his sleeve. He finds himself in cold sweat. "Oh, hell," he curses, leaping up, stumbling a little when his stiff joints protest the sudden movement. _I need to find Allen and get out of here._ Coat-tails flapping, he darts through the blank wall of the sound chamber, leaving only the lilting tunes behind.

(:~:)

"How are you feeling?" The sound is soft in the musky afternoon light of the chapel.

Lavi looks up from his bandaged hands into a pair of laughing dark eyes, framed by shoulder-length dark green hair. It suddenly strikes him how Lenalee's smile always returns after each battle unchanged, and as gentle and dazzling as ever. He feels a foolish grin spread on his own face, and quickly turns it into a cocky instead as he replies, "Just fine."

"Are you sure?" Lenalee tilts her head at him from the pew beside him. Then she nods and reaches up to brush his crimson hair away from a bruise on his forehead. "At least that's receding."

Barely hiding his sudden red on his cheeks by grabbing her hand, Lavi chuckles, "Lenalee, you worry too much," though he is secretly ecstatic. They simply stare at each other for a while, until the inelegant snorts of laughter from the science department and finders reach them from all sides. Kanda sulks in a corner. Lenalee blushes prettily. When the time came, they hadn't needed to say anything to each other, and Komui had given them his approval in a roundabout way by clapping Lavi on the shoulder heartily as he left the hospital ward, then traipsing off and sobbing quietly in his office. Lavi grins now at the memory.

The laughter rippling through the chapel turns into a sharp intake of breath.

Overhead, in the shadowed eaves, the immaterial darkness shifts, turning opaque, shimmering with silvered streaks. From the depths of the cloud seem to flow a pure melody, not one that can be heard, but one that settles in the mind of all those present, warming, familiar.

A pulse thuds through the shining sable.

A white figure drops out of a blinding fissure of blazing lightning, through unknown space, to land with feather-like lightness on the flagstones below, coat flowing on the waves of is impact. Cheeky-Grin Jamie squeaks with shock from the second row.

The person clothed in snow raises his dark-locked head, spirited golden eyes sweeping over them all. He rises with a single graceful motion. "We have news," Tyki calls, centring on Lavi and Lenalee. "Not at all good. But," – he motions above him with a gentleman's flourish – "I've brought someone home."

Someone falls through the Ark Gate. A beautiful, dazzling figure of power, with a iridescent cloak of grey, shining mask, and silver hair. He lands not with the elegance of Tyki, but with raw Innocence and magnificence.

Allen Walker raises his head and smiles at his friends. "Nakama," he murmurs, giving the strange half-smile that only he can give. "Do you not recognise me?" The Rose Cross gleams on his chest. His Innocence deactivates with a flash and whisper of air.

Lenalee bounds forward and throws her arms around him, already crying. Lavi stumbles over and punches Allen good-naturedly on the shoulder. Kanda looks away, muttering, "Tch."

Tyki grins from behind the high collar of his coat as he watches this scene. "Take him to Komui," he says quietly to Lavi, who nods, his smile nearly reaching to his ears. Tyki slips away into the aisle between the pews, coming to Kanda, near the rear of the room. "Where's Evelyn?" he whispers urgently.

Kanda continues to glare at the floor, then grabs Mugen from beside him and stalks out of the chapel. "This way," he snarls through gritted teeth.

They pace down the long corridors, the candlelight pooling about their feet, lighting up two men, one with dark, serious eyes, dressed in red and black, the second with eyes the clearest gold, clothed with snow and white. Tyki doesn't speak. He knows what must be coming, in the echoes of boots on the stones and the movements of their masked shadows on the wall.

Finally, hollow and dark, come Kanda's words. "I envy you."

Tyki jolts and looks at the back of Kanda's head a few steps ahead of him. Of all the things he had expected Kanda to say, this certainly hadn't been one of them. Wisely, he chooses to remain silent and allow Kanda to speak.

"You can stay with Evie forever." Kanda's voice cracks. "You understand each other." His footsteps never cease, lonely next to Tyki's silent hunter's tread with soft-soled boots. "Do you know what it is to be truly understood, to know the person there knows you for who you really are?"

"Yes," Tyki answers, finding it harder to speak than it should have. "And she accepted me for who I am."

"She understood me too. Maybe that's why she gazed a me with a sort of gentle pity when she left me to be alone." A warbled laugh explodes out of Kanda's lips as the hand holding Mugen shivers. "She belongs with you. She doesn't love me."

"She cares for you a great deal," Tyki sighs, watching wax drip off a passing candle.

"But she does not love me." Kanda's words are barely audible. "What's the difference in her eyes between you and I?"

"You said she understood you. But do you understand yourself?" Tyki smiles sadly as he sees Kanda straighten. "As I would say, do you know your own music?"

"No," Kanda whispers. "That's why she chose you, then." He stops by a flight of stairs. "Follow these straight down and tell the guards my name." His voice is once more dispassionate and hard.

"Thank you," Tyki says, and starts down the spiral, leaving a darkened figure behind.

(:~:)

Evelyn dozes on the sofa, facing the metal door, exhausted from yelling atrocities at the guards. She gazes blearily at the white cloth of the sofa arm, and closes her eyes for a moment. _Tyki, if you were here, I wouldn't even sock you. I'd just hug you._ When she opens her eyes, something cobalt blue and circular lies inches from her face. Blinking rapidly to clear her vision, Evelyn sees _her poker chip._ The one she'd given to Tyki. Even as she gazes confusedly at it, deft fingers enter her vision and brush the hair from her eyes, before scooping up the poker chip with long fingers.

"Tyki!" Evelyn yells as she straightens to find him standing in front of her, wincing as if expecting her to hit him. She doesn't. Instead, she asks flatly, "So, here to visit your imprisoned girlfriend? She isn't being a good girl and sitting pert in a cell while her boyfriend gets all the glory?"

Tyki doesn't answer immediately. He simply pulls her into a hug and murmurs, "I'm sorry. I should have come myself."

"Yes, you should have, moron," Evelyn mutters, sniffing imperiously. "I don't like staying out of fights. Takes all the excitement out of life. Speaking of which," – she leans back to examine him – "how did you get in here?"

Tyki's roguish grin makes her laugh. "I didn't bother with walls or doors." But he grows serious. "You know why you have to stay here."

Evelyn rolls her eyes impatiently, "Yes, because a newly developed Akuma can turn my brains into wacko scrambled egg until I plunge pins into all your voodoo dolls or something."

"Evelyn…" Tyki sighs. His looks so tired.

"I know," Evelyn says. "I just don't want to accept it."

Tyki kisses her forehead. "Stay here and it won't affect you. The battle begins in the morning. The Earl no longer trusts me."

As Tyki stands up to go, Evelyn leaps after him and grasps his hand. "You'll come back after the fighting?"

"Of course I will," Tyki answers through a grim smile.

"Swear." Evelyn's violet eyes are dangerously dark.

"Lady Evelyn Merle, I swear to return after the battle," Tyki says, with feigned flippancy, but Evelyn knows he cannot be more serious.

"Okay." Evelyn murmurs. "Return safely."

Tyki gives her one last parting embrace before melting through the wall.

(:~:)

Allen steps away from Komui for a moment to get a breather. Komui had given him a bear hug while simultaneously bawling his eyes out. Now, he sniffles as he tries to pull on a serious face at the intel Allen gave him. Even so, his grin is wider than Allen has ever seen it. Then Komui gestures weakly over his shoulder.

Allen turns to find the rest of the Exorcists assembled, all the Generals – he gulps when he meets his master's gaze – and the rest: Krory smiling fiercely, Kanda staring at the ground in boredom, Bookman, Marie and Miranda, Timothy, and Chaojii. Something within Allen sinks as Chaojii glares at him with open hatred. He sees their Innocence, flowing in the blood those with crystal-types, surrounding their weapons in a cloud of silvered dust, all powerful, and all unknown. He smiles at the beauty of it, despite himself.

Komui's voice, still laden with tears of joy, sobs authoritatively from behind him, "We have to prepare for war." At the end of the sentence, his voice squeaks as he sniffs again, and Cross's lips twitch with laughter. Composing himself, Komui continues, "But we don't know the Noah's tactics. We have only ever fought against them individually, not as a full group. This does not give us the advantage."

A champagne-cooled voice drifts over from the doorway. "I know how the Noah fight."

Everyone pivots to find Tyki leaning against the doorframe. "I _was_ their general, after all." He strides forward, past the Exorcists, saying coolly to Chaojii, "Don't even try."

Chaojii jolts, withdrawing his Arm of Baptism that had been poised to strike by his side.

"Do you mind?" Tyki asks Komui. Komui steps aside, letting Tyki address everyone. "The one weakness of every Noah is their longing for destruction. If we separate each one, then we can take them on their own. Should they try to fight as a team, they will be unstoppable. Each Noah has his own talents."

"Who will take the Millennium Earl?" Krory asks.

"Allen," Tyki answers. He grins at Allen's wide-eyed expression. "While training, he wreathed dark matter with Innocence. I believe that is our best weapon."

Chaojii looks as if he is about to speak, but doesn't say anything.

"Timothy," Tyki continues, smiling when Timothy jolts. "You will defend Miranda so she can heal and shield the rest of us." At his protests, he raises a hand. "You are far too young, and this fight will be too much for you, so defend well." He looks at them all. _Allen, Lenalee, Lavi, Kanda, Krory, Cross, Klaud, Tiedoll Socalo, Chaojii, Marie, and Bookman. _ "There are twelve of you against eleven Noah," he comments. "And with myself, Miranda and Timothy, that makes fifteen against eleven." He grins. "Should be fine."

The sixteen people in the room, including Komui, stand on the eve of the last battle, and no words can lighten the atmosphere.

(:~:)

The next morning, a red sunrise, a bloody warning in preparation for war.

Row on row of fortifications surround the chapel, with the entrance blocked up. Allen had created a weakness in dimensions from where he and Tyki had arrived, hoping that this would channel the Black Ark Gate to open there. Row on row of finders are assembled with talismans behind the entrance to the chapel, Miranda and Timothy at their centre, and within the chapel itself, twelve Exorcists stand to attention, Tyki joining them.

Around Tyki, last words before the fighting are being made; Lavi to Lenalee and Bookman, Marie and Miranda to Tiedoll, Socalo and Kanda brooding, Klaud smiling dangerously, Cross speaking quietly (unusually) to Allen, who is dressed as an Exorcist again, the Rose Cross glinting on his coat. Chaojii just glares at them all. Tyki takes note of this, and resolves to keep an eye on him during fighting. But Tyki's thoughts drift to Evelyn, locked in the chamber far below, and he wonders whether he can keep his promise.

A shiver in the melodies around him.

"They're coming," Tyki says quietly. The talking stills around him. Unbearable silence reigns.

A streak of dark light splits the white energy above, and six Noah flip in perfect unison the stones below. Wisely, Fiidora, Jasdero, Devit, Lulu Bell, and Sheril. A pause, as Sheril's lips twist into a mocking smile.

Then the war-drums beat to life in Tyki's consciousness, as he dances forward in steps of battle he knows so well, seeing the black figures of the Exorcists around him dart forward in a single, pure wave. After a moment, so do the Noah.

The two sides clash with a crackling retort, as Innocence crashes into tendrils of dark matter. Allen swings his sword toward Wisely, and he leaps back with a chuckle, only to flip under a handful of dark matter and return to the air as Allen's Death Ball explodes around him. Kanda is a shadow of twin-bladed death, twirling unseen between the Noah. Lavi and Lenalee are dancing.

Tyki sees Sheril throw Krory back with a precise stream of sable lightning, and leaps in front of him. "Brother," he snarls, pivoting around the next crackle of electricity.

"Tyki, darling," Sheril answers. "Time for you to join our forefathers, I think." Tyki's next handful of amethyst flame grazes him on the cheek. "Let's fight as we did when we were young, brother!" Sheril calls jubilantly. "But this time, the prize will be rather more precious than before."

Tyki frowns intensely and flips over him for a heartbeat, the white edges of his coat fanning through the thickening air. All around them, cobalt bullets, blades, hammer, boots, whip, monster and needles fall in deadly rain, amid cries of battle. And all the while, Tyki wonders, _Where are the rest of them?_

With four Exorcist Generals and Allen, the Noah are slowly beaten back, although the macabre, insane smile never leaves all their faces. Then Wisely brings his hand up to his temple.

"No! Don't–" Tyki begins, only to crumple to his knees as Wisely's mind shatters his with a thousand spears of cold metal. Struggling to make sense of the world around him, Tyki sees the other Exorcists in similar condition. Lulubell's silver tentacles waver in expectation, even as Fiidora readies a handful of dark matter and Jasdevit aim their revolvers. Sheril raises his long fingers in preparation; the puppetmaster. Tyki shivers as the shards dig deeper into his consciousness, until he is only a nub of music and light surrounded by a whirling maelstrom of dark matter.

Then suddenly, the world turns to crystal, and he is himself again. Tyki snaps toward Wisely to find him clutching his head and howling with pain. Tyki sighs and glances towards the barricade at the back of the chapel. _Thank you, Timothy._ Even as he thinks, Sheril moves his hand, and Cross leaps at Klaud, knocking her out of the way, avoiding the strings that could make them puppets. Sheril's growl is cut off in a strangled _gurk_ as Lavi plays tennis with him and his hammer.

Sheril makes a nice man-shaped depression in the wall.

Tyki grins as he sees Kanda fending off both Jasdero and Devit with twin blades, one metal and one of pure energy, a look of calm distaste on his features. He drives them into a corner, where Lenalee kicks away their hasty bullets and slams their heads together with a kick.

Tyki's joy is short-lived.

A silvered streak darts out of the Gate above, and with a precise burst of energy, carves a clean circular tunnel in the fortifications around the entrance to the chapel and slips out. No sound echoes in from the corridor outside.

"Silver Level Four!" Allen yells at Tyki as he ducks under Lulubell's tentacle, which is promply entangled in Marie's strings. "We need to get to Evelyn!"

"Allen! With me!" Tyki shouts in return, allowing Socalo to take his place, and pivots, powering after the Akuma. As he dashes past the many faces of the Exorcists, he finds one is missing. _Chaojii. Where have you gone? _His heartbeat triples, matching the frantic pace of his music, worried and yet so alive with war and fighting. He steps onto the suddenly solid air fluidly, throwing himself into the solid rock, Allen grabbing his shoulder from behind and following him through. Grey and airless and black, and then–

Ash.

The entire left side of the corridor is fine black ash and Finders' uniforms, the people that filled them long gone. On the other side, Miranda pants within a shimmering shield that protects the Finders behind her. The Silver Level Four is nowhere to be seen.

"Where?" Tyki yells desperately at her. Timothy points down the lightless corridor, past the carnage, with one small finger. Blood drips from his nose. Tyki guesses that Timothy must have tried to Innocencify the Silver Level Four, and drawn back injured.

With a quick nod, Tyki sprints down the hallway on light feet, using his abilities to push at the air behind him and lend his steps the agility of wind. Allen follows, grey cloak catching the sparse light around them and fluttering motes of it around the dark walls. Tyki reaches a spot and halts dead still, lazily reaching out a hand to catch Allen by the back of his cloak. As Allen chokes and splutters, Tyki closes his eyes and chooses not touch the stones under him.

They fall.

Allen's shrieks are torn away by tons of stone. Tyki shoves Allen in the shoulder with his other hand to shut him up and concentrates on the fall, bringing them to a sudden stop before stepping neatly out of a wall and depositing Allen at his feet.

"Why…did you…do that?" Allen gasps, wiping brick dust from his eyes.

"Because down was the fastest way," Tyki answers darkly, before sprinting off again. "I figured you wouldn't freak out!" he calls over his shoulder at the following Allen.

When they reach Evelyn's door, they find her pinned to the wall of the corridor, her guards slain, and the Silver Level Four's hand at her throat. Evelyn's boots dangle uselessly off the floor, and Acumen flutters on the stones. A moment later, she crumples, gasping for air, as Tyki's boot whams into the Akuma's head with a crunch, and Allen's crown belt envelops it in binding ribbons of white.

Tyki spins quickly, his coat flurrying around him like snow, holding his fingers together in a concentrated point, where crackling amethyst electricity sparks. Then he spins, drawing a circle on the air around him, trailing lightning, gathers his power, and slams it into the Silver Level Four with deafening, glorious intensity. The light casts them all in half-shadow, giving them a garish, half-human appearance. For a moment, it seems that they will be victorious.

Then Allen screams.

Crown belt snaps away from the Akuma, lashing through the air like piano strings that will reverberate with music no more. Tyki hisses as one slices him across the cheek. Allen goes limp, hanging in a powerful grip. Tyki's frantic eyes follow the fingers up to double-bracleted wrist, muscled arms, and the insane, revenge-filled eyes of Chaojii Han.

"I will have my revenge on you, the both of you, for Anita-san's name," Chaojii raves like a madman, his eyes hollow and dilated in the wavering light. Inhuman. He squeezes his hand, and Allen howls. If it weren't for Crown Clown's collar, his neck would already have broken. As it is, the situation is understandably precarious.

Then several things happen at once, leading to tragedy.

Evelyn waves a hand weakly, and Acumen binds around Chaojii's ankles and throws him off balance. Allen follows the motion to flip up and over him, evading his grasp and dancing out of the way. The Silver Level Four cackles and throws a stream of energy so powerful it coats their tongues with iron and sucks the colour of the air, a silent wave. Tyki leaps to shield Evelyn, and Allen ducks behind his cloak. Chaojii struggles to his feet.

The spear of dark light goes straight through him.

With a strangled gasp, he collapses, clutching the clean hole in his stomach. Blood pools around him, startlingly crimson. "No…how…" he gurgles in horror.

The Silver Level Four wastes no time. As Tyki and Allen rush to Chaojii's aid, a wicked smile twists its white child-face. The next moment, it opens its mouth, and a pure sound wave pushes the three of them down the corridor roughly, leaving Evelyn–

Alone.

Evelyn gazes blearily after them, still hearing her own music, but the Silver Level Four touches a smooth finger filled with purpose to her forehead, and she arches her back and screams. Acumen flares back to life, wreathed in black flames, no longer clear and scarlet-red. She falls into a waking dream, where she cannot control her actions, but watches everything with dulled senses as her mind walks in other realms of imagination.

Tyki and Allen scramble back toward them, to find the Silver Level Four cocking and ear and listening. Then they both feel as if a small, dead hand is clawing at their hearts, seeking their innermost souls. They gasp. As quickly as the sensation came, it passes. When they raise their heads, the Silver Level Four gestures, and Evelyn raises a hand gloved with Acumen.

Evelyn points up, eyes blank, and with whispers something that shivers with power. The music of hundreds of lives course through her.

(:~:)

Far, far above in the chapel, the Noah grin as pools of inky black spread around them. Clawing hands and fingers grip the rims and climb into the white. Akuma. Hundreds, Level threes and Level fours, all moving with the same insane, rolling, pain-filled laughter.

The Exorcists freeze mid-move. Kanda curses under his breath. And they leap toward their new targets in despair.

(:~:)

The Silver Level Four raises its head, and Evelyn does also. "I understand your power now," the horrible voice whispers. And as it speaks, dark matter flows into its hands, _Tyki's power._ And a grey cloak flutters around its shoulders. _Crown Clown?_

"It can't be," Tyki breathes.

The first attack with their own weapons throws them backward.

**I'm really mean to leave you hanging like that. Sorry. Next week is continued fighting and plot changing, and surprises. See you then.**


	7. Iridescence

**HUGE EPIC FIGHT! Yeah. And emotional scenes. This chapter was hard to write, trying to work out the plot and all. By the way, the 'running through the fields' thing in the recent chapter? I must be telepathic or something to have included that two chapters ago. Oh well. Enjoy. I don't own D. Gray-Man or any of its characters.**

**theristia: Sorry about Chaojii! I had to close that plot thread, and he was going to snap at some point. After Evelyn and Tiedoll had that talk about him, I wrote that they couldn't tell anyone or it would sow discord before the final battle, and weaken the Exorcists' bonds of trust. That was the way it had to be. You'll feel better after this chapter, I promise.**

**Avloth: Thanks for favouriting, and I hope you like this chapter!**

_To kill those reborn,_

_Three things needed to slay:_

_A drop of blood,_

_A cage of grey,_

_And an Earl forsworn._

Evelyn awakes to find herself in chains. Made of a purple so deep it is almost black, they encircle her wrists and ankles to stone, the grey sky overhead and the winter forests around her. With a jolt, she realises it is almost the exact replica of the dream-landscape in which Allen met Nea. A soft green glow illuminates her left side. Close, so tantalisingly close, her Innocence shimmers on a pedestal, just out of reach, a perfect sphere of green with a strange red and purple circular halo. The chains are pure dark matter – she cannot possibly break them.

"_Evelyn! Listen to me!"_ a voice echoes down from the ice-clouded sky.

"Tyki?" Evelyn calls desperately. "Where are you?"

Seeming not to hear, Tyki's urgent shout reverberates down again. _"Look at me! Can't you see me? Don't let it control you, fight it!"_

_I'm hearing people from reality, but I can't see them or respond,_ Evelyn realises. Then Tyki is joined by Allen, Tiedoll, Lavi and Lenalee, and other Exorcists, all trying to speak to her in the midst of battle. Evelyn hears an agonized scream, and knows that one, at least, has been marked by the fighting.

"Innocence, please," she whispers, head bowed, as the shouts and howls of pain swirl around her heart in an unbearable mix of pain and unknowing. But however hard she tries, she cannot free herself, and the Innocence does nothing.

(:~:)

"Evelyn!" Tyki yells again, watching with growing horror as the Silver Level Four advances, Evelyn pacing emotionlessly behind it. The chapel walls are shaking around them. Tyki doesn't know how they possibly returned here, but Evelyn had waved a hand and here Tyki, Allen, and Chaojii are, in the centre of a maelstrom of battle. Dark matter and Innocence revolve around them in iridescent streaks of amethyst, cerulean, gold, and emerald, but Tyki only sees Evelyn's blank violet eyes regard him emptily. "Please!" he calls in despair. "Fight against it–" the rest of his words are cut off in a grunt of pain as the Silver Level Four's cards slice into his left arm.

He clutches the wound, scarlet dripping between his fingers, and grits his teeth. Flipping backward, he barely dodges Sheril's invisible strings, and Allen darts off, weaving between them. As Tyki watches the Silver Level Four pace toward him, and with each step, gain another power, until it is bristling with twisted versions of Exorcists' weapons, he knows attacking it will do no good. Evelyn paces behind the silver figure, finding a path through the carnage of fallen Akuma, supremely ambivalent, blankly regarding Tyki.

Tyki sucks in a breath, and knows what must be done. _"Attack Evelyn!"_ he yells at his allies around him. _"Knock her out!"_ As he speaks, he fights past the self-loathing bubbling within him and lashes out with a whip of dark matter, intending to wrap it around Evelyn's wrist. He makes the whip curve gently, lest it should break the bone, but it still crackles with blindingly bright energy, it's tip deafening everyone with a sonic boom.

Evelyn calmly reaches up and grabs the whip, as if it is nothing but a strand of gossamer, thin and light. Then light pours out from where Acumen touches the dark matter, and Tyki releases the sable, as if stung. Evelyn returns to her position, empty and emotionless, only turning to avoid Cross's bullet and effortlessly flicking it back at him with a finger coated with Innocence. Cross deactivates the bullet just before it would smash into his face. Kanda grunts as Evelyn grabs Mugen's blade with her gloved hands and hurls him bodily away.

Lavi's single green eye widens as the Silver Level 4 returns his hammer strike with a grey version of his hammer. As the two metal cylinders, one red, one grey, clash in mid-air, Lavi grins and _conjures _a fire seal in the middle of a strike, the gaping, flaming jaws of the snake enveloping the Akuma in a searing cage of fangs.

But the Akuma tears through the snake with strings that hum with a familiar melody. Marie drops to his knees on the far side of the room, clutching his headphones and grimacing as _his_ music echoes and resonates within him. Then, as one, the Exorcists gasp as numerous cuts spontaneously appear, causing them to stumble. _Miranda must have folded,_ Tyki curses. His left arm is still pulsing crimson.

Step by step, the Exorcists are pushed back towards the end of the chapel. The stones are choked with Akuma bodies and slick with their coal-black blood, and hundreds more pour out of the Akuma gates in a tide of metal. Tyki sees Klaud go down in a spray of purple from her leg, and Cross catch her and retreat. Lavi and Lenalee are back-to-back, but tiring. Tiedoll tries to activate his protective garden, but a Level 3 swoops down and takes the attack, preventing the garden from growing. Allen barely blocks the next strike to Tiedoll in time, and retreats, protecting those around him. The air is thick with dark matter and Innocence, building to the point in which breathing is no easy task. Tyki dodges what he can, but feels another cut open on his leg, the scarlet matching his cheek and his arm. All throughout, the Silver Level Four lazily throws the Exorcists back with dark versions of their own weapons and the Noah's, Evelyn following behind.

Then in the carnage, Sheril's voice commands. _"Stop!"_

The Exorcists halt, panting, pressed against the wall in a tiny half-moon of space, Akuma and Noah surrounding them. As if the Exorcists do not exist, Sheril slips through the bristling hedge of weapons until he faces Tyki. The two brothers stare at each other, one with sallow, yet handsome cheeks, gazing coolly through a monocle as he stands tall; the other with youthful features, clear golden eyes made sharper by pain, blazing over a cut on his cheek, one hand clutching his scarlet arm.

"Surrender, brother?" Sheril asks with a twisted grin.

Tyki straightens painfully and chuckles. "Really?" he laughs breathlessly. "You're playing _that_ card?" Blood drips down his chin. "You, Sheril, have _no_ imagination." He fixes his brother with a glacial stare. "Or are you really thicker than you look?"

Sheril smirks and turns away. "Brother Fourteenth! Will you revert and join our ranks?"

"You really _are_ thicker than you look," Allen says with a frighteningly white grin, raising his hands in mock horror. Cross snorts with laughter to the side.

"You _do_ know if you don't surrender, we will simply destroy everyone in this Order of yours?" Sheril continues pompously. "With the Innocence of Understanding in our control, we can do anything."

Tyki tilts his head. "Not really," he shrugs. "You're wallowing in so much pride that you aren't looking behind you."

"Who's using clichés now?" Sheril taunts. "The Silver Akuma will be our–"

A scream.

Evelyn drops to her knees behind the Silver Level Four, clutching her arm. Chaojii smiles blearily from a pool of his own blood and his head sinks back down again. Sheril spins back to Tyki, chuckling, "Was _that_ your move? That pathetic human barely managed to draw blood."

"But he managed to draw blood nonetheless," Tyki murmurs.

Drops of scarlet drip down Evelyn's arm and into her glove. Acumen shivers, and with it shudders every Akuma in the room, including the Silver Level Four.

"You haven't…" Sheril curses as he sees Evelyn blink slowly. "How did you possibly…?"

(:~:)

Evelyn had been close to despair when the sharp spike of pain enters her arm. Raising her head, she finds a warm splash of crimson welling from a cut on her forearm, and it congeals into the winged figure she saw when she crystal-typed. The same grey-clouded vista still surrounds Evelyn, and she realises she must still be in the world of dreams. But the winged figure stirs, and turns its head to her.

"Innocence?" Evelyn whispers to it. "Do you understand me?"

The figure nods, and with a gentle flutter of wings, soars over to her Innocence, diving into the green sphere. _A crystal type responds to the Exorcist's blood._

A flash of lighting crashes into the depths of Evelyn's mind, a single stroke of power that clamours with thousands of voices, calling her name. _The souls of the Akuma,_ Evelyn realises, _are calling for me._ Her Innocence darts over to her, bright and iridescent and burning, and forms gloves on her hands. The chains snap in a cascade of metallic chimes. As the taste of iron coats her tongue and a sense of incredible power fills her veins, Evelyn opens her eyes to the light of the chapel.

Akuma, Noah and Exorcists stare at her.

Evelyn breaks into a smile, and warmth flourishes in her violet eyes like lavender in full bloom. "Dirtbag," Evelyn declares cockily at Sheril, "I'm going to pound you so hard your twisted grin will slide off your face."

Tyki feels relief wash over him as her music reaches his mind again.

"Akuma!" Sheril calls, a hint of fear showing in his voice. "You know what to do."

Rather ironically, the Akuma do nothing.

Evelyn steps forward and gazes at the Akuma, her eyes shimmering with the reflections of things only she and Allen can see. "Friends," she murmurs. "I'm sorry for aiding them in bringing you back into this horror. Will you fight with me? I understand you." As if in response, Acumen hums on her hands, and somehow, the Akuma around the chapel shiver, seeming more human than they ever seemed to be. Seeing this, Sheril motions with one hand.

Six Noah leap towards Evelyn. A thousand Akuma swoop to intercept.

Tyki and the Exorcists stand frozen for a moment, too dazed to realise what is happening. Then they too draw their weapons and dart in to join the fray. Tyki draws twin knives from his boots and imbues them with dark matter, turning them into deadly amethyst blades.

Evelyn calmly stands in the midst of the fray, Acumen forming an energy shield supported by cards around her. _I understand the Noah, _she laughs within. _I know from which melody their power comes from._ She closes her eyes, listening to the Noah from what her cards whisper to her. The two red leather bands on her wrists, all which remain of Acumen that touches her skin, tremble slightly. Then with a gentle rustle, they unfold into twin Jokers, floating down to her hands, where two fingers clamp each card. _"Jokers,"_ she whispers, _"Jest."_

Sheril howls as his invisible strings are severed with a sharp _snap._ Wisely clutches his head and hisses, the eye on his forehead snapping shut. Lulubell's tentacles retract into her sleeves, and she sways as if swooning. Fiidora's handful of dark matter sputters pathetically into nothing. Jasdero and Devit swear loudly and smash their pistols against the ground, but they remain helplessly jammed. They try to run into each other and merge, but only end up whacking their faces into each other. They stare at one another; Their powers are gone. They look up as a thicket of Exorcist weapons stab at them.

"Oh, crud," Devit whines.

Lenalee sends a heel into his throat, slamming him across the floor to fetch up against Lavi's hammer. Lavi promptly starts to play whack-the-mole with him, more than a few strikes finding their mark. Devit squeals as he scurries about like a field mouse around the strikes. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

Sheril finds himself inelegantly running about, dodging Akuma strikes while Krory drops in from above, Allen pokes Sheril's back with his sword and Tiedoll doubles over with laughter. Wisely retreats behind Tyki's twin knives, ducking around the purple flashes of light, but he is too unused to being powerless and Tyki's footwork is too good. Tyki feints to the right, and as Wisely flinches, he spins in a breathtakingly fast move to the left and slams the hilt of his weapon into Wisely's chest. Wisely deflates so quickly, he makes a sound like an emptying helium balloon. Tyki flips forward and adds to Wisely's backward momentum with a sneaky kick.

Lulubell and Fiidora fare no better, Kanda and the rest of the Exorcists surrounding them. Soon, six Noah are back-to-back, hemmed in on all sides with Akuma and Exorcists.

Lenalee grabs Lavi's jacket and hauls him up toward the dark eaves above, then lets go. Lavi drops toward the Noah, his hammer blurring beside him, the Chinese character 火 appearing on the Noah below. With a resounding _boom,_ six Noah are smushed beneath a fire seal. When Lavi flips back to land crouched beside Lenalee, the Noah are too dazed to even twitch.

Hushed silence.

"Did…did we win?" Timothy's voice drifts over from the hole in the chapel wall. Lenalee and Lavi dart over to Chaojii's unconscious form and lever him through the hole in the wall, where Finders wait to rush him off to the infirmary.

"There are more than six Noah," Cross says grimly, as Lavi and Lenalee return.

Tyki chuckles. "They can probably sense their brethren failing miserably."

"Don't worry, I can read their music," Evelyn's voice is strained, but her expression is one of calm composure. Her eyes are still closed. "They won't be able to use their powers."

"Are you sure?" Allen asks doubtfully.

"Nope, but what's the use of worrying?" Evelyn says brightly, as her brows furrow with concentration. "Ah, there they are. Yes…I can read them– ARGH!" Tyki darts over to her as her knees tremble and threaten to fall. She raises her head tiredly. "Putrid scumbag," she mutters, eyes fluttering open. "The Millennium Earl's signature is bloody difficult to read. I don't think I can help you there."

Allen winces. "They're coming now." He gestures at the ceiling, where, miraculously, the dimensional gap is still pulsing.

One by one, the Noah fall out of the fissure. Toraido. Maashiima. Maitora. . And coming right after, a little girl with spiky blue hair in her best skirt and boots, landing with a gentle wisp of air that betrays her true strength. They reel and examine their hands, even Maitora in his full-length wrapping. Evelyn smirks. Road raises her head and grins. "Allen," she says, finger to her lips.

"Road," Allen answers impassively.

Road glances at Tyki, her lips curving into an arch smile. "Your girlfriend seems to haven take away our powers."

"Yes. Isn't she wonderful?" Tyki answers flatly.

Road stands still for a moment, then leads her brothers to join the other Noah, ringed within a mass of Akuma. She seems strangely confident in her incarceration.

"Any time now," Cross mutters, rolling his eyes at the ceiling and making a show of yawning. "You _do_ like an entrance, don't you, fatso?"

In answer, a pudgy figure in a yellow-grey frock coat drifts out of the dimensional gap, holding securely onto a pink umbrella with a pumpkin head, the other hand on the hilt of his massive sword. The Millennium Earl's impossible grin never wavers as he floats like an overinflated balloon down to the stones below.

"Hurrah," Cross comments drily. "Should we clap?"

The Earl stares, narrow eyed, at Tyki, and with a voice of icy syrup, says, "Tyki. I'll deal with you later."

"No _Tyki-pet_ now, lardball?" Tyki answers fluently, raising an eyebrow as he strides forward. His slowly congealing blood patterns his white coat with crimson thread.

Ignoring Tyki, the Earl raises his twisted voice. "Fourteenth," he calls, and Allen turns toward him. "Always the traitor, aren't you?"

"I decided to follow the steps of my predecessor," Allen calls. He cocks his head at the Earl and blinks. "You know I can see your Noah?"

The Earl says nothing, but shock emanates from him.

"The other Noah, Tyki, and even Sheril," – Allen gestures – "have a human side as well. You don't. You don't have any music, Earl of the Millennium. Evelyn can't read you because you are essentially soulless." He tilts his head. "Does that bother you?"

The words sink in. The Earl watches mutely, and seems to shift, his hand moving in a blur. A ringing clap sounds, reverberating in the bones of all those present. The Exorcists blink. Tyki must have moved faster that they could have seen, for he has an arm around Evelyn, his other hand shielding her. Kanda stands in front of them both, Mugen at the ready. And before all three, Allen stands, sword out. The Earl's huge broadsword lies a few feet from Allen, evidently just knocked aside.

"That was low," Allen comments. "Throwing your sword at Evelyn."

"No," the Earl snarls, hiding nothing now. "That was intelligent." His sword flies back into his gloved hand. Something seems to irk him.

They circle each other, mirrored swords twitching like snakes about to strike. "You know this can only go two ways," Allen begins evenly, watching the Earl's movement with a hawk-like glint in his grey eyes. The Earl does not respond, so Allen continues. "Seven millennium ago, you battled the owner of the Heart and won. And so for the next seven thousand years you have ruled the hearts of humans."

"Yes, yes," the Earl spits out, as if each word is chewed into pulp before ejecting from his feral grin. "But what does that have to do with now?"

Allen cocks his head. "I am the owner of the Heart."

The watching Exorcists, except for Cross and Evelyn, suck in a breath as one. They had not known, for Allen had not wanted to burden them with the knowledge that if defeated, Exorcists would cease to exist.

"How strange," the Earl simpers haughtily, as his fat feet match Allen's pace in the ever-revolving circle. "How strange that the Fourteenth should reincarnate into the owner of the Heart."

"_I_ call it convenient," Allen says. "You don't dare to use any of your greatest moves, do you? Because some small part of you knows the power of the Heart." A white grin spreads. "Where are the Third Exorcists, Earl?"

"Elsewhere," the Earl growls.

"You called them in to help, didn't you?" Allen whispers. "But I drove them away."

"That is impossible," the Earl snarls.

"I simply willed their Innocence to be elsewhere, and they left," Allen grins. "So the Heart is not a simple piece of Innocence, Millennium Earl. It contains the power of all the pieces combined." At this, a shiver runs through the others in the room.

Allen's next words shock the Earl to the core. "So, when Apocryphos stated that the Heart was worried for me, it meant that either I could choose to be Noah, and so destroy the Heart, or to be Exorcist, and repel the Noah. Black or White. Either way, I would be nowhere near powerful enough." He smiles at the Earl. "But I prefer to be Gray."

"Stop your silvered words, Fourteenth," the Earl spits.

"Ah, but my words hold weight," Allen murmurs softly. "You see, I think that I was allowed to be both Exorcist and Noah for a reason. Twice before, you were challenged. The first time, only with Innocence. You defeated them. The second, with dark matter. You defeated them. This is the third time, and I come with both. I knew that when my sword was the opposite of yours, I exist to defeat you, and so, I do not think you will be victorious." Allen looks older than his sixteen years.

"Logical fallacies," the Earl cackles.

"Well, third time's the charm," Allen shrugs. And in that tiny movement, the Earl crosses the space between them in an eyeblink and scythes his sword toward Allen's chest, the wind of his passage roaring out around him.

Allen pivots to the side, moving neither too slow nor too fast, but with perfect precision, bringing down his blade on the Earl's, twisting the grip so the sword clatters out of the Earl's hand, bringing his own sword up to the Earl's collarbones, and Allen closes his eyes.

The Earl raises an arm and stops, as if frozen by an invisible force.

The Exorcists gasp in unison. It feels as if something warm and alive has awoken within their hearts, a trembling power that fills their ears with a ringing music and sparks electricity in their fingertips. Evelyn feels the Jokers shiver in her hands, and joy spreads through her. _Of course. This is how it must be._

(:~:)

Deep in the darkened levels of the Black Order Headquarters, Hevslaka throws back her mane and screams in exultation. In her embrace, every fragment of Innocence pulses, flashing bright green in a glowing pulse of power. They listen to the Heart, to its little whisperings and its singing.

By Hevslaka's side, Komui and Reever watch in awe. They had gone down to protect the Innocence. "Does something make you think of Allen right now?" Reever breathes.

"Of course. It has to be him," Komui answers with certainty, though his brows furrow with worry. "But I am afraid for what comes after.

(:~:)

And all around them, the Exorcists and Tyki hear a melody, clear and pure, true _Music_, a lilting tune with sweet words that passes out of memory, except for Evelyn, who feels the words sear into her mind, branded into her consciousness and never fading. _And so the boy falls fast asleep…_ The music of the White Ark.

Another melody, darker and deeper, drifts down. The two different tunes wrap around one another, separate. The music of the Black Ark.

Glowing tendrils of sparkling dust emerge from over each Exorcist's heart, iridescent, shining. They waver through the air, tasting the music, before darting toward Allen and flowing into his heart. A moment later, the White Ark's music becomes not just a single tune, but a wonderful, swelling harmony that paints the world in lines of gold and notes of silver. Coated in Innocence, it becomes crystalline.

Two swirls of dust, one white and one black, finger down from the crack above, and wrap around the Noah within the circle of Akuma. Two similar columns of dust do the same to the Earl. Allen smiles, and the two separate strains of Music, black and white, merge into a harmonious melody of neither light nor dark. So do the silvery dust columns. In doing so, a shudder runs through reality, as if the puzzle pieces of the world rearrange themselves, yet fit together perfectly in their new pattern.

Allen raises his voice, young, yet wise. "I have merged the White Ark and the Black into one of Gray. Reject your Noah, and allow me to remove them from you, and you shall walk free as humans." He gazes steadily at the Noah. "Remain Noah, and the Gray Ark will be your prison forevermore."

The Earl does not speak. He glares at Allen with unbridled vehemence, with the hatred of one who knows he has come to his Waterloo at last.

"So be it," Allen murmurs.

One by one, the Noah within the circle are taken by the shimmering, glassy arms of the dust and into the silvery Ark Gate above. As the motes surround Road's waist, she turns to Allen, her eyes wide with feigned innocence. "Are you going to kill me?" she whispers in a childish voice, looking, as she appears to be, a small girl in a pretty skirt, begging for her life.

Allen stares at Road. And in that one pure moment, Evelyn senses the Earl gather what power he has left in a single strike towards Allen's binding wall of music. Perhaps the Millennium Earl believes that Allen will hesitate.

Allen doesn't.

Road says no more as she is sucked upwards into the Gate. Allen chokes the Millennium Earl tighter with the bonds of music, and says softly, "This is for both humans and Akuma, Soulless One."

Then the song builds about them, and the Millennium Earl rises toward the Gate by an impossible force, even as he opens his mouth and shrieks one last curse toward Allen. "May you never find peace, Fourteenth!"

"And may you rot, First," Allen answers evenly, as the white-gloved hand of the enemy of the Exorcists since the elder days disappears into the gray Gate.

(:~:)

The music flows clearer, as if cleansed of some filth. Evelyn heaves a great sigh, and the Akuma sigh with her, fading away into nothing, their souls at peace. Acumen once more forms gloves on Evelyn's hands.

Twelve Exorcists and one young man in a white coat stare at each other in the stifling emptiness of the chapel.

Then a hoarse chuckle sounds from beside Evelyn. "What shall you do with me?" Tyki asks Allen.

"Take your Noah out of you," Allen answers simply.

"I suppose it'll hurt?" Tyki muses, rolling his eyes in sarcasm.

"Well, yes," Allen says plainly.

"Don't let go of my hand," Tyki murmurs to Evelyn alone, his shivering golden gaze betraying the fear so well hidden in his silvertongued voice.

"Never," Evelyn answers through her fatigue, favoring him with a smile.

Allen returns his sword to his shoulder, turning it once more into sharp-fingered left arm. He strides to where Evelyn and Tyki are sat by one another on the cold stone floor, sits cross-legged in front of them, and looks at Tyki.

Tyki nods once, and squeezes Evelyn's hand hard.

Allen leans forward and plunges his left hand wreathed with dark matter through Tyki's heart.

Tyki sucks in a breath, lowers his wide-eyed gaze to the hexagons surrounding Allen's arm. "Well, this is nostalgic," he mutters under his breath. "So this should make us even." His grip weakens dangerously on Evelyn's fingers, but she holds him tightly.

Allen sees Tyki, dressed in his blood-spattered white coat, but he also sees the chains of Tyki has bound Joido in. Allen moves his fingers and finds Joido's throat. Joido shrieks, and Tyki jolts, and beads of sweat break out on his forehead. Without another word, Allen pulls Joido from Tyki's heart, feeling the bonds between Tyki and Joido tear.

Tyki screams, a ragged, raw cry of agony to the heavens. Evelyn lowers his head gently to the floor as he loses consciousness.

In Allen's hand is a twisted remnant of evil, dark-shadowed and white-jawed, the chains of music binding it gone. Allen grimaces at it in revulsion. With barely a flick of his wrist, he sends Joido streaking into the Ark Gate above. Allen remains watching the pulsing grey for a moment, then says gently, "My turn."

"What?" Lavi exclaims.

"I must try to remove my Noah from within myself," Allen grins.

"That isn't possible." Cross's voice cuts across them. "You may die, Bakadeshi." Oddly, concern permeates his voice.

"Master, I sealed the Noah within an endless dimension in the Gray Ark," Allen says with a tired smile. "They're not quite dead, so they won't reincarnate, but they aren't alive either. Not within the rules of this world. I'm the First Noah now."

"So…" Cross murmurs.

"So I can't take my Noah out like I did with Tyki. I'll always have to have a connection with it. But if I lengthen the connection by making my Noah reside in the Ark so I am always connected with it, then I can ensure the other Noah will suffer their eternal twilight for eternity. And when I die, I shall seal the Ark with my last moment, so that without a body to be reborn into, the Fourteenth shall be gatekeeper forevermore, a prisoner in his own prison."

Surprisingly, the gnarled voice of Bookman asks, "How do you know you will succeed?"

Allen chuckles. "The Heart told me. But you will all have to help me."

In unspoken unison, Lavi, Lenalee and Evelyn walk over to Allen and place their hands on his shoulders. A moment later, the rest of the Exorcists follow, even Timothy, who has slipped into the chapel from the hole in the wall. Cross grins, his reckless, dangerous grin, and joins the crowd. Bookman, after a moment's hesitation, follows.

That leaves Kanda alone, facing his colleagues' expectant faces. His face is a mask of emotions, and his hand rests on Mugen.

"Yuu," Evelyn calls gently. "Please." At the use of Kanda's first name, Tiedoll shifts slightly, sending her a questioning look.

Kanda stares at her for a long moment, his gaze dark, but intensely deep. Then he bows his head and strides over to join them. His gloved hand finds Allen's shoulder.

"Once more, Innocence." Allen whispers.

And once more, every piece of Innocence flares, and the Exorcist see in their minds' eyes Allen's Noah. It is supple and sable, darker that the other Noah's, yet smoothly ambivalent. "I'm going to need some help now," Allen growls through gritted teeth, eyes clenched closed. As one, the Exorcists find the nub of power in their minds and push it toward the Noah within Allen, using the pure energy to surround the Heart, drawing from its power.

A darkened mist rises from Allen's Crown Clown cloak, dancing toward the Ark above. It is not twisted like the other Noah were, but sinuous, and it slips into the Gate. A ripple passes over the Gate, and it slides shut, leaving the chapel eaves beautifully arched and empty. The music of the Ark fades away into the golden noon air.

Allen's eyelids flutter closed, and he stumbles, but a dozen hands steady him. "Allen-kun?" Lenalee calls urgently. "Are you alright?"

Allen gray eyes slowly slide open. Then he grins as only he can, with weary battle-tiredness, yet true joy. "Yes. I'm fine. Better than ever, actually." He stands tall once more, his cloak swishing about his shoulders, still gray, but a wonderful clear hue. "I can still feel it, you know. My Noah. But it's far more distant." Allen grins. "I like it that way."

The sun filters in through the windows, falling on their scratched faces, warming their wearied limbs. Lavi whoops ecstatically and swings Lenalee around in a circle, her crystalline laugh joining his. Bookman watches them with a seemingly impassive expression, but hides a smile with his voluminous sleeve. Kanda mutters "Tch," and turns away, but the small uplifting at the corner of his mouth doesn't escape Tiedoll's gaze. The generals congratulate each other cordially, and Cross begins to poof out his chest, declaring his greatness. Allen places a well-aimed kick to the back of Cross's knees, and a moment later, Tiedoll is struggling to hold Cross back while Allen is similarly restrained by Marie and Krory. Timothy runs about, getting under everyone's legs, and Timcanpy appears out of nowhere to fly around their heads. Soon enough, delirious shouts of anger (on Cross's part) and joy (on everyone else's) echo about in the glorious sunlit chapel.

A comical groan from the floor startles all of them.

Tyki moans as he shifts onto his side. Evelyn rushes over to him. He opens his eyes, and Evelyn freezes in shock. Where his eyes were once golden, they now have flecks of green in them, more human and warm than ever before. "Tyki?" Evelyn asks hesitantly.

"Evelyn." Tyki slowly breaks into a wide grin, unrestrained and filled with mirth, no longer shadowed by the dark. "I can still hear your music. I can hear all of your music!" he exclaims at everyone present, his voice growing tangibly estatic. "This is amazing! It's like I was hearing it muted before, and now it's so sharp and clear and incandescent, it's like liquid light–"

"Shut it, Curly-hair," Kanda growls on the side.

A murmuring laugh spreads, and in a somewhat dreamlike state, they all climb through the wall to the other side of the fortifications. Hundreds of Finders gaze at them expectantly, Komui and Reever among them, an unspoken question on their lips, as a recently awoken Miranda runs up and throws herself into Marie's arms, and Lenalee does to same to Komui.

Allen nods. "We won," he says hoarsely, as if hardly believing it himself. "We won."

The Black Order explodes in Jubilation.

In the pandemonium afterwards, Allen feels a touch on his shoulder from behind, and swivels to find Cross staring at him with a strange expression on his face. Speaking slowly, as if the words are hard to come by, Cross says gruffly, "Well done, Allen."

Allen laughs as Tim settles in his hair. He sees it now. Cross's expression is one of pride. "Thank you, Master," he returns. "You know how much that means to me." Cross nods and wanders off, trying to maintain a scowl on his face. His lips are twitching with the strain.

Tyki's hand finds Evelyn's in the gloom behind the revelry. "We need a holiday," he says to her softly.

"I'll book a ship passage," Evelyn whispers back happily, giving his hand a squeeze. "We could stay at my place for a week."

"Or a month," Tyki murmurs in an undertone.

In the concealing darkness, Tyki feels Evelyn smile.

(:~:)

In the tinkling of instruments from the infirmary doorway, a slow step on stone resounds.

Howard Link steps out of the shadows and into the infirmary, where doctors and nurses bustle over the still form of Chaojii Han. Judging by the amount of scarlet on the instruments, he is not doing well.

"Leave us," Link calls to the people in the room. They stop their work and stare at him, but his authority is unmistakable. One by one, they put down their instruments and stride away, leaving Link alone with Chaojii.

Link looks down at Chaojii Han, at all that blood, crimson that coats even the double bracelet on his right hand. "Why have you not turned into a Fallen One, Chaojii Han?" Link muses. "Is it because you saved Evelyn Merle?"

A constricting feeling in his chest.

Link touches the spot above the cross-shaped scar on his chest, and the Atuuda flickers to life in front of him, a golem meant for healing. Link grins. "Well, Atuuda, if you want, then so be it."

The Atuuda glows, and flits down the horrible wound in Chaojii's stomach. A fiery light begins to glow from within the symbol on the Atuuda, turning the egg-shaped golem into a lighted lantern. Link closes his eyes and senses Chaojii's injuries, imagining the physical joining together of the blood vessels and muscles, becoming whole once more. The strain on Link's strength is sudden and sharp, but he turns from Chaojii's physical wounds to his mental ones.

"_Chaojii Han,"_ murmurs Link, _"Forget."_

And with that word, Chaojii is changed. He remains unconscious, but healed, the same old Chaojii who had two best friends, who became an Exorcist to avenge his Anita-san, and has aided in revenge.

Link straightens as the Atuuda darts back into his chest. "Now you will hate Allen no longer."

He melts back into the gloom as the Exorcists are hurried in and their many hurts attended to. Link thinks he sees Tyki's eyes flick to where he is hidden, but Tyki does not say anything, only smiles knowingly when Chaojii's recovery is found.

Link watches Tyki and Allen, notes the change in them. Then he turns and strides off. _It's time to report this to Leverrier._ But he allows a small, rebellious smile to fall on his features. After all, the people he now considers nakama are safe, and the war is finally over.

**Whoop. What did you think? I tried to get the emotions and the atmosphere right. Well, the next chapter is the Epilogue. I'm going to be heartbroken, finishing this story. ARGH. But the time is right, and I won't have much time to write except a few oneshots next year, due to exams. Sigh. Grateful to you all, and see you next week.**


	8. Duet

**Epilogue, epilogue, why must all fics end? Wahh. I think I closed all the threads here, not to mention you'll get a wonderful bit at the end. I can't say any more. I'm going to get emotional. I don't own D. Gray-Man or any of its characters. The next bit of poetry is from A Charade of Flames, and I added a two lines.**

_Dust and velvet, dusk and gold,_

_conductor's baton, song foretold,_

_Cards and Poker, tone and dance,_

_waltz and leather, voice entranced._

_Night and Twilight, Day and Dawn,_

_Ark and tower, times foregone,_

_Noah and exorcist, dark and light,_

_Words and Music, black and white._

_But should notes of song meld night and day…_

_Black and white would turn to Gray._

(:~:)

Evelyn sucks in a breath of cool morning air as she halts outside the Order entrance, glad to be home. Her dark traveller's cloak flutters in the breeze. A low groan sounds over her shoulder. A few steps behind her, Tyki staggers after, laden down with pieces of baggage. Evelyn's lips curve in a smile. How could she have refused his sweet offer to carry their burdens? And anyway, this amuses her.

"How can you possibly _need_ so much stuff?" Tyki pants, perspiration dripping down his chin, dark hair flopping messily into his green-flecked gold eyes. A faint scar across his cheek holds testament to the fighting weeks ago. A carrier bag slips down his bent back and whams painfully against the back of his head, his high-collared sable coat making no difference at all. Rather, its long hem gets caught in one of the cases.

"Mother got me so many nice things while I was away, I had to bring them back with me," Evelyn replies easily, as they halt in front of the Gatekeeper. They had spent a few weeks at her parent's back in Guangzhou, and another few travelling there and back. _It was a fun journey,_ Evelyn reminisces. Tyki had been surprised to know she played the piano, and played it well, but henceforth their violin-piano duets had entertained her parents greatly. _Not to mention–_ she grins bemusedly as she recalls the first two weeks, in which Tyki, unused to living without his ability to choose, kept walking face-first into doors. When they had arrived in Guangzhou, her parents had laughed quietly at the large, oval bruise on his forehead.

Tyki notices Evelyn's arch smile and mutters pathetically to himself as he tries to straighten up. He is only partially successful.

The Gatekeeper's wizened face unfreezes from the unforgiving stone and blinks as he examines the two travellers. Evelyn he passes over without comment, recognising the Innocence in her gloves; but when his gaze falls on Tyki, his bulbous nose begins to run and his stony eyes bulge, and he begins to shriek, "_Noah! NOAH!"_

Tyki rolls his eyes at the Gatekeeper's antics, and shuffles forward to kick his chin, cracking the stone in the impact. "Shut up!" Tyki hollers at him. "If you can't even open your snivelling eyes wide enough to see a _reformed_ member of the Noah clan, you're not fit to be Gatekeeper!"

The Gatekeeper opens his cavernous mouth to shriek again, but something crimson and heavy slams into his chin and keeps his lips shut tight.

Lavi holds his hammer in place underneath the Gatekeeper's chin, ignoring the stone face's moans of indignation, and breaks into a wide smile, single green eye twinkling. "Welcome home," he says coolly.

Evelyn bounds forward and hugs him, laughing. Tyki stumbles the last few steps to the Order entrance and shifts a few bags up his arm to shake Lavi's hand. Lavi, gentleman as he always is, immediately lightens Tyki's load by half, easily shouldering the cases. However, Lavi's courteous action doesn't stop the sly grin from spreading on his face, and the wink in Evelyn's direction. Evelyn chuckles. Tyki sinks further into his foul mood.

The Gatekeeper has by this time sufficiently recovered to open the door for them. The three of them stride through, to be met by Komui, a multitude of Exorcists, and a number of science department members. Apart from Tiedoll, none of the Generals are present, but Evelyn doesn't mind, as Cross being there would certainly sour the proceedings. As she breaks away from Tiedoll's welcome-home hug, she scans the crowd present, skimming over Tyki and Allen's friendly argument, Lenalee's laugh, and frowns. Kanda is not there. She raises her eyebrows at Tiedoll, who shakes his head grimly.

So, giving exhaustion from her travels as a reason, Evelyn subtly excuses herself from the throng and heads off. Tyki's gaze grazes hers, and he gives her a minute nod to show that he understands.

Evelyn ducks into an alcove halfway to her room and settles down to wait. In the half-shadow of the alcove, with the high walls surrounding her on three sides, stray thoughts enter her head. Firstly, while at her parents', she had seen something inexplicable…

Evelyn had gone downstairs to get a glass of water before going to bed, and through the ajar door of the library, she heard muted voices. Silently, she padded over to the solitary bar of lamplight, and fitted her eye to the crack.

And she saw Tyki deep in conversation with both her parents. Tyki seemed to stumble over his murmured words, but there was a glow in his golden eyes that showed sincerity. Their voices were too low for Evelyn to hear their conversation, but she saw her father shake Tyki's hand with a strange half-joyful, half-sad smile. Her mother actually embraced Tyki, touching his cheek as if he were her son.

Turning, Evelyn had crept away from the scene, a whirl of confused thoughts coursing through her.

Now, leaning in the cool darkness of the alcove, she still cannot find a reason for what she had seen.

The hallway is made of the same echoing grey stone that all the Order's corridors are walled with, and should anyone walk along one, their crashing steps can be heard. Evelyn closes her eyes, and pushes her confusions out of her mind, so her consciousness is as smooth as mirrored glass, reflecting all disturbances around her.

Silence.

Evelyn grins, opens her eyes, and says amusedly, "Tyki."

A sigh sounds from behind the corner, and Tyki slides into the alcove, muttering ruefully, "How is it that can I fool everyone but you?" His steps are soundless on the cold stone.

"I know you better," Evelyn answers, raising one eyebrow.

"And I know you best," Tyki returns.

"Then you must see what we have to do for Kanda," Evelyn says, a hint of sorrow entering her words. Her violet eyes are overcast.

Tyki nods, sober. "I know exactly what to do."

(:~:)

Allen strides by the Infirmary and halts to watch the room within. Chaojii sits up in bed, bright-eyed and animatedly talking to Maosa and Kie. A mass of white bandages is visible under the neck of his hospital gown. Chaojii had woken up from a coma barely three weeks ago, dazed, but smiling. When questioned subtly about Allen, Chaojii had been found to remember nothing of his hate of him, and had instead greeted Allen cheerfully, as if he had never harboured bad feelings in the first place. Chaojii's face is recovering its original laughter now.

Allen smiles gently as he turns, the red-rimmed edges of his Exorcist uniform brushing his ankles. But the grin slips from his face as his thoughts turn to other faces. The others had not known, but each desperate face of the Noah are burned into his mind. Their screams, reverberating through the Ark, were likewise only heard by Allen. Now there is only silence in his mind, but still, Road's face, both young and not, fades in his line of sight. Her sobs were the last to fade into the empty void of lost dimensions.

Allen halts and leans his head against the cool, smooth surface of the stone wall. He knows that over time those memories will fade, but presently, they are clear-cut and sharpened, like blades in his mind.

"Allen-kun?" a concerned voice intones.

"Lenalee!" Allen exclaims, his face washing scarlet as he turns. "I didn't know you were…"

Lenalee tilts her head at him, then reaches forward and resolutely grabs his arm, dragging him off. "You need to speak to someone."

"Who?" Allen asks, confused.

"Bookman. He'll understand some of what you're going through," Lenalee answers.

"What?"

Lenalee sighs. "Bookman was there a few decades ago when the last Noah clan nearly fell. He has seen plenty of death as a bookman, and dealt with it, so he can help you."

"But…" Allen murmurs, "How is that…?"

Lenalee says nothing more, just drags him onward with an exasperated look on her face.

(:~:)

Lavi looks up bemusedly when Lenalee bundles Allen into the room. But his eye narrows when he sees Lenalee's serious expression.

"Where's Bookman?" Lenalee asks, looking about the room.

"What, have you told Allen yet?" Lavi returns airily.

"Told me what?" Allen says warily.

Lavi's next words are like a blow to Allen. "We may have to leave headquarters for a while. A long while," Lavi says cheerily. "To fufill our duties as Bookmen. The war is over here."

Allen's mouth drops open. "But…why are you two so happy?" he stutters.

"Because we won't be leaving the Order. Not exactly. We'll still be Exorcists, and be on…say…long-term leave, attacking any leftover Akuma, and recording history as Bookmen. And," – Lavi reaches for Lenalee's hand – "Lenalee will be coming with us. With me," he adds with a bright smile. Lenalee returns it wholeheartedly.

"But you'll visit?" Allen's expression looks perilously fragile.

"Of course, idiot," Lenalee sighs, swatting him on the arm.

A sudden thought occurs to Allen. "How did Komui react to this?"

"He tried to drown himself in tears," Lavi laughs, "but he let us be after Lenalee told him she now knows my true name."

"Lavi told me," Lenalee blushes. "I'll miss my brother, but I won't leave him, or the Black Order, permanently."

A gnarled voice intrudes upon their conversation. "Yes. Lavi here has broken so much of the Bookmen's Code that I decided we should keep the tradition." Bookman has a ghost of a grin on his wrinkled features, something so unusual that Allen cannot help but stare. "Now," Bookman growls, darting nimbly onto a cushioned chair, "Tell me what troubles you."

"Well…since the fighting, I've been…" Allen stutters uncertainly.

"Say no more," Bookman says, tapping his sharpened nails on the wooden surface of an armrest. "You are haunted by the faces of the Noah."

"…Yes," Allen answers, half ashamed, half relieved. He sinks into a chair.

"As you well should be," Bookman continues, to Allen's surprise. "You are only human." Bookman's gaze turns hazy, and he speaks of years of war. "I have seen an uncountable number of wars. Lavi, who has seen nigh on fifty wars in his short life, has only skidded across the surface of human misery."

Lavi dips his head in confirmation, holding Lenalee's hand tightly beside him.

Bookman gives a short, barking laugh. "We Bookmen are supposed to be emotionless," he chortles, "but we are human. So yes, those wars haunt me. And yes, I have seen beautiful faces on both sides turned lined or sorrow-filled by battle. You should not feel any different, Allen Walker."

"So…the sorrow I feel for my enemies is _natural_?" Allen splutters.

"Yes. And over time, those memories will fade. But therein lies the point." Bookman reaches a lined hand for a teacup. "You, Allen Walker," Bookman comments, "feel compassion for everyone. Humans, Akuma, Noah." He smiles. "I do not often take sides in a war – in fact, I ever did at all – but in this case, I feel it was right that you were the one to conquer the Noah."

"So it was better that I was the one to defeat them than any other?" Allen asks in wonder.

"Yes, yes, little sprout. Now stop acting like a child and be _happy_," Bookman grumbles, sipping his tea.

Lavi and Lenalee drag Allen out the door, amid his indignant exclamations. But Allen's heart is lighter now, and free from its burden of guilt. Both his hearts are now free.

(:~:)

Tyki and Evelyn had carefully concocted their plan, and now, in one of the Order's many unknown rooms, a shining black piano waits expectantly, a violin in a velvet-lined case resting on the table beside it. The room hums with the shivering silence before the coming of music, played by two masters.

Evelyn and Tyki stand in the centre of the room, facing each other, holding hands, eyes closed. Acumen glows with purple pulses on Evelyn hands, amplifying Tyki's power to listen to the music of those around him. As each person passes in and out of the two joined minds, Tyki and Evelyn hear their music, and Acumen understands what those people yearn most for in their lives.

Then in the field of black and white notes, a powerful cerulean thread. _Kanda's melody._ Evelyn's eyebrows meet as she wills Acumen to amplify Kanda's music and allow her and Tyki to understand its intricacies. A flute winds its way about drumbeats and harmonies, but the more they listen, the more Tyki and Evelyn find their pulses racing.

Simultaneously, Tyki and Evelyn run to their instruments. Tyki snatches up the violin and sets the bow to the strings. Evelyn holds her hands motionless above the keys of the piano, liquidly soft cut-off gloves leaving her fingers free to play. Their eyes meet, golden-green to dark violet. Then together, their hands move not of their own accord.

It is hard to play Kanda's melody, with all its sheets of azure and webs of silver, in a duet, but Evelyn and Tyki weave a deeper pattern, somehow encompassing the power of each broken chord and each ornament so that Kanda's music is played truer and more beautifully than ever before. They need no score; Acumen has given them perception and understanding.

Evelyn's fingers fly over the keys, each note perfect, dynamics and articulation impeccable, joy-filled. Tyki's violin is sweetly melancholy, his elegant fingers finding the right points with blindingly fast movements. Together, their melodies define Kanda as a person.

Further down the corridor, Kanda straightens as if an electric current has run up his spine, listening, listening. Gasping, he tumbles to the floor beside the wall, leaning against it, feeling the vibrations of the music through his fingertips. The lilting, colourful notes speak to him, whispering, laughing, singing whimsical things, sorrowful things, but together allows him to finally see what lies within.

Kanda Yuu understands _himself_; he understands all his past burdens, his loss and his redemption. Kanda understands what qualities he must find in Someone.

The notes whirl about him like autumn leaves, caressing his cheek, comforting, and slowly fading, but he will never forget them. Kanda's music is his forever. The last chord ripples away; violin and piano cease to sound.

Kanda stumbles down the hallway to the door where the music came dancing, and finds his cheeks wet with tears. "Thank you," he chokes. "I know what to do now."

"You're welcome!" two voices holler from within.

Kanda nods, and strides away, each step becoming more purposeful, yet light and uninhibited.

(:~:)

The summons for the Exorcists to gather at the Chapel came in late afternoon, when the lazy air is hazy with dust motes and the slowly approaching dusk. The chapel's repairs had been finished barely a day ago. The light filters gently through the stained-glass windows, over the heads of the assembled Exorcists filling up the first two rows of new pews, and the science department members and finders behind. Chaojii grins happily beside Marie, the nurse having given him permission to attend. Kanda is squished between Krory and Marie, but for once, he does not seem angry. Before them all, the four Generals stand shoulder-to shoulder, each in Exorcist uniform of sleekest sable and glittering gold. Komui and Leverrier stand next to them. Link is hidden in the shadows on the side.

Tyki grins from where he is seated between Evelyn and Lavi; he has already guessed the purpose of this meeting. But he holds his tongue, for Komui is about to speak.

"Friends, of the European Branch," Komui begins, grinning at the assembled people in front of him. Someone with blond hair yells something in the back of the chapel, and Komui shouts back in return, "Shut up, Bak! You don't count." Stilling the general murmur of laughter with a raised hand, Komui continues in a softer tone, "Today, we have to take a moment to remember those who have given their lives to this war. Please join me." He bows his head.

A full minute of silence. Evelyn shuts her eyes and leans against Tyki's shoulder, letting memories wash over her.

Komui looks up, blue hair swinging, and says grandly, "And now, we must honour those who led us to victory." He motions. "Lord Tyki Mikk, step up, if you please."

Tyki rises fluidly from his seat and ambles up to Komui, hands in his pockets. "Yes?" he grins.

Leverrier regards him with a contemptuous glare, saying with great dislike, "We have decided that in favour of your help to the Black Order in the war, you may stay in the Order and aid the Exorcists in the eradication of all remaining Akuma."

"Oh, wonderful," Tyki comments dryly. "I'm _ecstatic._ Do I get a title or something?"

Komui hides a smile. "No," he replies, "but you do get these." He motions, and Link comes forth with two beautiful silver and sable daggers, similar to the ones Tyki used in the last battle, but decorated with jewels set to make the pommels look like poker chips, and with small crossguards emblazoned with the Rose Cross.

"Thank you," Tyki says, sliding the knives out of their sheathes to examine them. "They're exquisitely beautiful. And who knows, Leverrier?" – Tyki gazes at him coolly – "You may see me use them first-hand."

This cocky double-remark fuels discreet threads of laughter amid the applause. Tyki returns to his seat, returning Evelyn's sly grin.

Komui again raises his hand for silence. "Now for the next honouring," he calls. His eyes are piercing behind his clear glasses, and his sharp gaze falls on one white-haired young man.

"Me?" Allen coughs, grey eyes widening.

Evelyn rolls her eyes and prods him out of the pew. On the other side of Allen, Lenalee does the same. Allen strides, albeit with shaky legs, up to Komui and Leverrier. With a gulp, he fades the crowd bashfully, trying hard to stop fiddling with his fingernails.

"Allen Walker has shown extraordinary bravery," Komui declares, his voice clear and carrying, grinning at Allen's discomfort. "He has conquered troubles both around," – he claps a hand on Allen's shoulder – "and _within_ him." Allen blushes, but before he can say anything, Komui continues eloquently, "He is a point breaker, and he banished the Noah, but most importantly, he is the possessor of the Heart Innocence." Komui pauses for effect, revelling in how important he is sounding right now.

"Therefore, we have elected to make Allen Walker an _Exorcist General._"

A moment of silence. Allen gazes blankly at Komui, then to Cross, whose face is studiously blank, but whose lips twitch. "Master?" Allen asks hesitantly.

"You will call me Master no more, Bakadeshi," Cross murmurs, staring straight ahead, a strange note of regret entering his words. But, the corners of his mouth spasm, as if he is struggling not to laugh. "And I must no longer call you Bakadeshi, Allen."

"Thank you, Master, but I prefer to call you so," Allen says quietly. "You have earned enough of my respect."

Cross nods gruffly, a small uplifting of the corners of his mouth betraying his real pride. Tiedoll whacks him, none to gently, on his back.

"Well," Komui exclaims grandly, "Let's congratulate our new General, shall we?"

The chapel bursts into tumultuous applause as Link emerges from the shade and approaches Allen, a new uniform folded in his arms. Inky black with gold trim, the Rose Cross gleaming with inner light on the front. As Allen accepts the uniform, he finds himself thinking, _Have I made you proud, Mana?_ But he doesn't need to wonder. He already knows the answer.

Allen Walker has been made a General, and shall be an Exorcist forevermore.

(:~:)

Tyki finds Evelyn where he knew she would be: on the plain over the cliff, far, far above the Order. There, is a tiny circular table covered with a velvet tablecloth, wooden with stone seats. The entire plain is bathed in silver moonlight, far softer and less garish then human lamps. Evelyn shuffles a pack of cards expertly with trim fingers, not Acumen, but rather, ordinary cards. Their white faces spill across the sable surface of the velvet.

"Found me, then," she murmurs, turning to him with twinkling eyes. The moonlight glances off the poker-chip and card pendant at her hip. Something in the way that Tyki smiles back, his hands deep in the pockets of his dark trousers, his high-collared white shirt softly bright in the night air, makes Evelyn think he is particularly handsome tonight.

"You knew I would," Tyki answers softly. He slides into the seat opposite her. "Missed you at dinner."

"I felt like watching the moon," Evelyn grins, looking up and allowing the silver luminance to wash over her features. Tyki watches her wordlessly, entranced. Evelyn laughs. "It's particularly bright tonight." Then she tilts her head at Tyki, a wicked smile spreading. "A hand of Poker?"

"Of course," Tyki chuckles. "But Acumen…" He reaches forward and taps the back of her hand with one long finger.

"_Very_ good, Tyki," Evelyn replies, mock impressed, "With Acumen, I can read the cards. But very well." She removes her cut-off gloves and places them beside her. "There. It's a fair game now."

Evelyn deals the cards onto the black surface, as if the sable velvet is a map. Afterwards, each of them examines their hand of cards. _I won't use my usual methods this time,_ Evelyn finds herself thinking. _I'll allow this game to come down to chance, for once._

"Here's my first bet," Evelyn declares, reaching into her pocket, and scattering a few silver coins onto the velvet, where the shimmer like the moon itself, high-pillowed above them, gazing fondly at the couple. The stars whisper to each other again, laughing, yet wholly mesmerised by the spectacle as much as humans are mesmerised by the starlight.

"And this is my only bet," Tyki answers, placing a small, purple-clothed pouch gently at the centre of the table. His fingers linger on it for a moment; but he withdraws his hand.

"What is it?" Evelyn asks amusedly, reaching forward for it.

Tyki stops her with a raised finger. "Win, and you'll know." His golden eyes are inscrutable.

Evelyn sighs. "Very well," she says archly, fingering her cards. She notices that Tyki swallows, and seems altogether less smooth and more nervous, running a hand through his raven hair. "Tyki, dear," Evelyn laughs, "Are you so eager to win that you feel uncomfortable?"

"No," Tyki answers, rather too hurriedly. "Ready when you are," he breathes quickly.

Evelyn's confident voice declares, "Alright. Three, two, one, now."

Two perfect spans of cards are placed on the inky tablecloth. Tyki grins and sits back. "And to you goes the victory, Evelyn," he sighs. But something in the way his chin dips reveals that he might not be too upset, after all.

"Don't be too disappointed," Evelyn says, reaching for the pouch. "Now can I see what this is?"

"I'm not disappointed," Tyki answers, with a warmth in his words that makes Evelyn glance at him, furrowing her brows. "Open it," Tyki murmurs.

Evelyn loosens the tasselled string about the neck of the little bag, slips two fingers in, and pulls out a beautiful amethyst ring.

Evelyn stares at it, stunned, then looks up to find Tyki's knowing smile and soft gaze grinning at her. "Are you…?" she whispers. She doesn't speak further. For once, she cannot find the words. Her eyes, as amethyst as the ring, shine with promise.

Tyki rises slowly from his chair opposite, and strides over with liquid steps, taking her hands and sinking down on one knee before her, looking up into her eyes. "Lady Evelyn Merle," Tyki begins, shaking slightly on the words, yet making music with them with his soft intonation. "Will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?" His hands are steady on hers, yet Evelyn can feel his rapid heartbeat through his fingers.

Evelyn swallows, blurting, "How did you know that I would win that hand of Poker?"

Tyki laughs, a short release of pent-up breath. "You won me over," he says warmly. "And I hope that now, I'll win _your_ hand. So will you?" There is an urgency to his words that belies his hidden fear, as well.

Evelyn reaches forward to touch his cheek. "Yes," she answers simply. "A thousand times yes."

Tyki breathes out and bows his head over her hands, sliding the ring onto her finger. His dark hair conceals his face. But when he raises his head and rises, helping Evelyn up, his lips are twitching uncontrollably.

Evelyn joins him in their joyous, brilliant laughter, which twines into a shared melody even as Tyki hears their music become simple variations of one another's, a harmony of harmonies. With a shout of laughter, Tyki swings her around in a circle, the tips of her boots just touching the ground. Evelyn smiles dazzlingly at Tyki. She doesn't need Acumen to understand him.

The wind rustles in the grass about them as Tyki gives Evelyn a kiss. When they break apart, their crazed, insanely bright smiles have still not faded. It is unlikely they ever will.

And all of a sudden, dozens of voices exclaim in congratulations about them, and all their nakama dart out from the shadows, surrounding them in a laughing, shouting crowd of joy. Tiedoll sobs unashamedly as he shakes Tyki's hand and hugs Evelyn. Allen, Lavi, Lenalee, and the other Exorcists take turns to come forward and congratulate them.

Off to the side, Reever elbows Komui when he realises Komui's eyes look red. "Are you crying, supervisor?" Reever grins.

"No, of course not, Reever," Komui snaps, sniffing. "I have hayfever."

And in the midst of all this, Tyki never releases Evelyn's hand. She holds on just as tightly. In the shadows far from the crowd, they both see something.

Kanda, dressed in full traveller's harness, dips his chin at them both, a nod of both gratitude and farewell. He turns and melts into the night, smiling. He has someone to find.

Tyki and Evelyn dance with their friends that night up on the height, with the fresh wind playing with their hair and their hands locked tight, never letting go. No longer Noah and Exorcist. Simply Tyki and Evelyn.

Their music will be a seamless, silvery duet forever.

FINIS

**And that's it. Well, what did you think of that? I think I'm probably going to cry. I love fanfiction, however short my fanfiction 'career' has been. Now I'm going to have to give it up for study and exams next year. Writing is… like a fire, really, once it's started, you can never really quench it. I promise I'll be back with a few oneshots every now and then, but until next summer, I can't write full-length fanfics anymore. WAHHHHHHHHHH!**

**So, now I have to give my thanks to those who encouraged me on the way.**

**Firstly, to , fanfictioner and my beta. Sis, being telepathic twins totally helped the betaing process. *Seriously, read her fic. It's great.***

**Lotusmelody17: *Hugs* Thank you for following my story, and loving Tyki and Evelyn's relationship as dearly as your own. I suck at saying sentimental stuff, but seriously, thank you for encouraging me, making me laugh, and making the entire experience of writing genuinely more enjoyable. I will still follow your fanfic, and wait for it eagerly. If Tyki and Evelyn were chibis, they'd both hug you.**

**GreentreeFrog, MoolightArrow: GreentreeFrog, you wrote the longest review of my fic ever. Love you for that. Gave me the zing for the next couple of chapters. MoolightArrow, your enthusiasm made me squeal. I love both of you for liking Evelyn. It's not often people like OCs.**

**Meemertree, I'm too lazy to log in: Thank you both for reviewing, I adore you both :D**

**To all those who favorited or story-alerted, thank you. I'll treasure you all forever.**


	9. Note

**When I was drowning my sorrows for finishing this fic in other manga, I came upon Fullmetal Achemist. All FMA fans, just to say, I've written a oneshot about Roy and Riza called Fireflight. EDIT: It became a multi-chap fic quite quickly - but don't go yet! There's a Christmas Special next chapter for Tyki and Evelyn.**


	10. Christmas Eve

**Hey, I know its been awhile, but since its Christmas, you all get a treat. CHRISTMAS SPECIAL! I've really missed writing about Tyki and Evelyn, so here. Merry Christmas!**

The ways of the Ark are strange.

From the topmost pinnacle to the white room of music at its heart, there are a thousand new sights around every corner, pure marble cobbles to grey stone, gateways and doors to a million dimensions, each accessed by simply turning the doorknob a different direction, by whispering certain words, by tapping unknown rhythms on the cobbles with dancing feet, or by such a simple action as a laugh.

Tyki had explored all its intricacies and its secrets far before the other Noah were incarcerated forever in its dark centre. And for all this knowledge, he can only conclude this: that the Ark is ever unpredictable. A single different note or dynamic on the white piano could change the very weave of the fibres that make up the white city. So, one must not distract whoever controls it, or catastrophe could ensue.

But the ex-Noah of Pleasure makes mistakes every now and then.

And given Allen's musical connection to the Ark, perhaps it is _not_ a good idea to give him a frightfully hard Rachmaninov piece and expect him to sight-read it to perfection first try. The Noah, trapped in the confines of the Ark, had been tearing their ears out in pain from the music Allen had been playing.

Two grand pianos, one of ebony, one of a wood so pale it is almost white, facing so that their curved shapes just fit together, wait expectantly in the chamber, the white-mantled woods surrounding Headquarters visible outside the window. So Tyki's gloriously smooth voice flows out over Allen's hunched form in front of the white instrument. "This is _Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2_, adapted for a duet of two pianos. I shall play the orchestral parts and you shall play the piano part. And yes," – he flashes a rakish grin at Allen – "your part is more intricate."

"But why–"

"Because you asked me to teach you more piano. And to put it simply, your piano-playing abilities don't go beyond poking out _F__ü__r Elise _one note at a time. It breaks up the mood completely. You have absolutely no notion of fingering. And I shudder to even mention your _articulation, boy._"

"But do I have to start with _this?_ Shouldn't I start with something simpler? Or are you simply a bad teacher?"

A sigh. Long fingers run through curly hair. "I talked it over with Evelyn. It's either me teaching you or her."

"And why would it be bad if she taught me?" Allen growls, white hair dancing around him crazily, framing his head in irregular feathers of snow.

Tyki raises his hands in surrender. "Fine, they're your fingers." He leaves the score on the sable surface of the piano, and turns, calling resignedly to a certain person outside the chamber, "He wants _you,_ apparently." The very picture of adorable, ruffled-hair dejection, Tyki leans back against his piano and opens his arms to what he is sure must be a comforting hug from his fiancé.

As usual, he doesn't get one.

Evelyn's cut-off gloved fist slams into the top of Tyki's unruly head, and as Tyki's clear golden eyes begin to water with unbidden tears, she smiles, violet eyes twinkling, and says sweetly, "Tyki, dear, do yourself a favour and don't be your usual moronic self. It isn't what a handsome gentleman should do when he greets his lady."

Tyki, who had felt a sort of tired resignation when she had called him by his usual title, _Moron_, perks up at the _handsome_ and reaches up for her hand with a laugh saying, "We've been over this too many times. So am I not a gentleman today?"

Evelyn's glacial stare stops him in his tracks. "There's no need to flirt anymore, moron. We're engaged. Now get off this piano bench so I can teach Allen some music." But a small smile tugs at her lips, one that is invisible to Allen, but all too obvious to Tyki.

While a visible raincloud descends over Allen's curled form, Tyki finally catches Evelyn's hand, straightens, bends in an elegant bow from the waist to kiss it, and then strides to the side, idiotic grin adorning his face. The grin is replaced with a wince, though, when Evelyn tears off her gloves and throws them with a crystalline laugh at the back of his head.

As Evelyn begins to instruct Allen in a voice sparkling with humour, Tyki glances down at the gloves in his hands. Evelyn's anti-Akuma weapon is Acumen, crystal-typed weapon of playing cards that now deactivated, take the form of gloves. Acumen is just that – understanding. Evelyn had always had a way of understanding others, but when she had met Tyki over an unfair game of poker in which they both cheated until they drew, Tyki's ability to hear the music of the world, both his and everyone else's, had given her power unimaginable. It had been Evelyn, after all, who had listened to his music of the Noah and separated white and dark, freeing him from Joido's chains; Evelyn, who had heard the melodies of Akuma and freed them, binding the dark matter of the other Noah until Allen sealed them in combined Black and White Arks, throwing the Fourteenth's power in after them to be sentinel forever.

And it had been Evelyn who had read between the dancing harmonies of Tyki's heart and seen his true identity, understood the web of guilt around his mind and accepted him for who he truly was. And he had loved – and still does – her way with words, turning their duet into a song with her piano, his violin, and the hidden choirs of the world around them.

Now, Evelyn stands silhouetted by the soft winter light of the window, laughing animatedly as she points out the intricacies in the flowing variations of black notes playing hide and seek on the five-lined score. A flash of deep velvet purple sparkles across Tyki's vision as the clear sunlight catches the amethyst ring on her finger and wreaths her fingers in violet flame. It is as if she is poised in the midst of battle, playing with unfathomable power cupped in a delicate hand. _Her ring. Her engagement ring._

Worry worms its way down from Tyki's brain into his stomach, forming a roiling ball of heat that presses against his heart and makes each breath a battle. Tonight would be Christmas Eve, and they are to be married on the first day of the new year. The logical part of his music declares that all will be well in a proud blast of brass. But stealthily, strings sweep into a diminished chord that springs out of nowhere, sowing dissonant, broken woodwind notes in their wake.

Tyki groans imperceptibly. He may have become conductor for his inner orchestra a long while ago, but sometimes, his music seems to have a mind of his own, influencing his emotions. _What if her parents don't arrive in time? And what about Lavi and Lenalee? Did our message reach them? And I know Tiedoll said Kanda has a knack of sensing these things, and he would return, but should he miss the wedding in just over a week's time… Evelyn would be so disappointed._ He wants her to be happy, more than anything. The barrage of doubts threatens to overwhelm him, sweeping through his music like the percussion gone awry, timpani missing that crucial half-moment of motion that should have set each hit directly on the beat, but missing. He curses. _Keep the music under control. Keep yourself–_

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME, WOMAN?!"

The terrified scream lances through Tyki's consciousness and sends him reeling. As the seat of his pants makes painful contact with the teak floorboards, Allen's next scream, even higher pitched than before, snaps Tyki's gaze up to the scene before him.

Evelyn' sardonic grin is in full, glorious being as she raises a hand, Acumen darting from Tyki's grasp and flaring in amethyst-flamed cards that hover in her power over Allen's left hand, caught in her vice-like grip. "Oh, keep still, Allen," she chides softly. "I'm just going to trim your nails somewhat."

"YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" Allen positively screeches, trying desperately to withdraw his hand. "THAT INNOCENCE IS A PART OF ME!"

"Tyki, dear," Evelyn calls over to him. "Didn't you instruct him on articulation?"

"Of course. He just wouldn't listen." Tyki's golden gaze is unreadable – well, to anyone else except the formidable girl who raises an eyebrow at his expression.

A pause. "I see," the wind-chimed voice tinkles. Tyki feels his breath whoosh out of him as Evelyn's penetrating gaze turns back to her victim. "Allen, you can't possibly play anything with those inch-long nails. Even tunes with _extreme_ rubato would be ruined by your articulation."

As Acumen makes its exquisitely slow descent towards his long black fingernails, Allen arches his back and throws a glance full of suffering towards the ex-Noah of Pleasure. "Tyki-_san_." – Tyki grins slightly at this – "Help me," Allen half-begs, stretching his other hand towards him in despair. "Stop her." All trace of his usual self-assured demeanour has vanished in an expression of pure fear.

Tyki appears to contemplate the situation with mild interest, while Evelyn halts and tips her head at him questioningly. Allen trembles. His fate is yet to be decided. At last, Tyki seems to come to a conclusion. "I'm sorry, my friend," he replies, his voice a velvet masterpiece of regret and sorrow. "I'm afraid, as I told you before, they're _your_ fingers." He shrugs, a casual motion that sends his shadowy fringe playing with the golden light of his irises. "And it's your loss." He turns and smiles gently at Evelyn. "Please continue, my dear."

"Thank you, Tyki," Evelyn flashes him one of her warm, yet slightly dangerous, smiles, and sets to work.

"What? NO! WHY–" the rest of Allen's words are swallowed up by his ensuing shriek. He grabs a nearby bottle of sake to stave off the pain.

_I declined to mention, Allen,_ Tyki thinks grimly as he averts his eyes politely,_ that my decision also stemmed from the fact I'd rather weather your wrath than hers._ Some small part of him slaps himself mentally for his wounded pride. _But then,_ he reflects,_ better wounded pride than suffering worse than death._

Allen's screams reverberate down to the entrance hall below as Tyki winces sympathetically. _Lavi and the others would do well to hasten their pace._ Evelyn Merle strikes again.

But a sudden warping in the music around them sets his fingertips tingling.

Evelyn freezes. "What..."

"That melody…" Tyki breathes. "Could it be…"

Amethyst eyes meet gold. "Lavi," they murmur in unison.

(:~:)

Even as Allen's muted wails echo about the stone walls, a certain flame-coloured head tilts to one side as a single emerald green eye winks at the gatekeeper. "Oi! Old man gatekeeper!" Lavi calls to the stone face above. "Wake up. We want to go through and greet our friends. We didn't travel throughout the night for nothing."

With a snore that trembles the ground beneath three pairs of booted feet, the gatekeeper promptly ignores him and slumbers on.

From a dimly lit room somewhere above in the Science Department, Reever stifles a yawn and twiddles with the volume control on his headphones, blinking to clear his vision. For a moment, he stares at the three colourful specks against the blinding white of snow. Then he spits out a mouthful of lemon soda and grabs the intercom.

"_Lavi! Lenalee! Bookman!"_ Reever's voice rings out clear and true from speakers hidden in the cliff face. _"Is that really you?"_

"Yo, Reever!" Lavi drawls, raising a casual hand to his eyes to shield them against the morning light. "How've you been doing? Finally get a girlfriend yet?"

Reever's reply cancels out in a frenzy of crackling.

"Lavi!" Bookman's voice is as sharp as ever, albeit issuing from the height of Lavi's elbow. "Perhaps you should be more aware of your manners."

"But Panda Jiji…" Lavi's whine is cut off by a howl of pain as the old man explodes into panda form and whacks his grandson about the head.

"WHO'RE YOU CALLING A PANDA?!"

As the full-fledged brawl between grandfather and grandson erupts with all the force fuelled by their complete memories of every single fight they have ever had, a light voice sighs, "You guys…" Lenalee straightens her travelling coat, removes her hat, and strides purposefully to the face in rock, her red anklets tinkling above leather ankle boots. "Gatekeeper," she says sweetly, reaching forward to scratch him on the chin, "Could you please open the door? For me?"

One lazy stone eyelid slides open with a crunch. "Lenaaaalleeeee!" The gatekeeper's smile spreads like a crack meandering on the cliff face. The next moment, Lenalee smartly leaps backwards to avoid the rush of air as the gatekeeper chokes back a sob. "I was terrified you were Akuma!" he half-wails, the sheer volume of his voice wrenching Bookman and Lavi from respective headlock and wristlock.

"What did you think, idiot?!" Lavi yells back at him. "Do you know how few Akuma there are in the world now?" The gatekeeper quails from the force of Lavi's green glare, and would have continued to wail, were it not for Lavi unsheathing his hammer. The bright crimson of polished metal reflects his grin as he whirls it around his head, spinning what should have been a crushing weight as if it is no heavier than a birch switch. "Or would you like to find out what a combined fire, wood, and wind seal could do to rock?" he asks coldly. "My abilities have grown these past few months."

From just within the entrance hall, Reever slides to an unruly halt, lab coat flying out after him, and frowns. There is no trace of the grinning Lavi he always knew in that hardened voice.

With a deep earthen rumble, the gate slides open.

"Thought so," Lavi says quietly, all seriousness. He doesn't meet Reever's eyes, instead training his dagger-like gaze on the ground between his feet. Then, as he is just about to pass the periphery of the gatekeeper's vision, he explodes with laughter. "You should have seen your faces," Lavi snorts in a very ungentlemanly way. "Did you really think I'd have changed very much?" he shouts between gasps of air. "I may have seen a few more wars, but I still _love_ a good laugh. Get over here, Reever, _sa_?"

Reever finds himself so confused over the sudden change that he can only numbly return Lavi's enthusiastic handshake and Bookman's polite one. He _does_ perk up when Lenalee gives him a hug, though. "So there aren't many Akuma left?" he asks. Lavi nods. "Pretty soon we'll be sending Exorcists out on mission to erase all traces of the Noah, or any dark remnants. Then our job is done," Reever muses. "Hey, I should tell the others!" he starts. "You've been greatly missed by Allen and Ev–"

_Evelyn._

Lavi is only dimly aware of an incoming burst of scarlet and amethyst, his own melody suddenly reverberating in his head as his Innocence shivers with recognition at the person who brought his music to life, before Evelyn hits him with the hardest tackle-hug of his life. His _only_ tackle-hug, actually, apart from the one time Lenalee practically ran into his arms after a particular mission. But Evelyn's embrace is made all the more powerful by the fact she has wound Acumen around them like a tightening rope with a thousand times the tensile strength of carbon nanotubes.

As quickly as she had entrapped him, Lavi finds himself released as Evelyn darts over to Lenalee. As Lavi blinks away crimson and opens his mouth to suck in a breath past his bruised ribs, a long-fingernailed hand reaches forward and grasps his free left hand, pumping his arm up and down ecstatically. "LAVI! WECOME BACK!" an annoying (incidentally, why does Lavi think it is so?) voice shouts.

"Allen…" Lavi manages something akin to a smile even as his spiky hair wilts slightly at the barrage of hyperactive joy. "Good to see you." He winces as Allen's fingernails dig into his skin. "No gloves?"

Allen _giggles_, much to Lavi's horror, and scratches the back of his head in an embarrassed manner. Lavi notices his sleeves are rolled up to his elbows. "Tyki's been teaching me piano…" Allen mumbles, turning steadily redder by the minute. He calls wildly over Lavi's shoulder, "Lenaleeeeeeee!"

Lavi flings an arm around Allen's shoulders, ruffling his white hair with his other hand. "Have you been drinking?" Lavi mutters under his breath.

"Nothing much…_hic…_only…_sake_…"

"How much?" Lavi asks warily as Allen mumbles some more and then flops pathetically onto his shoulder. "Naa…Allen? Allen-san?"

Velvet voice on silk. "Enough, apparently, to get him inebriated," Tyki chuckles as he proffers a hand from behind Lavi. "Welcome back."

With some difficulty, Lavi shifts Allen's weight on his shoulder and shakes Tyki's hand firmly. "Thanks."

With a laugh, Tyki turns with an agile motion from Lavi to Lenalee, catching her hand with a cocky smile. He half-bows, but seems to reconsider at the last moment. "Permission?" he calls quietly over his shoulder.

"Perfectly fine with me," Lavi replies, shifting Allen again. _Man, he's gotten heavy._

Tyki kisses the air above Lenalee's hand and murmurs, "It's a pleasure to have you back, Lady Lena."

"Thank you, Tyki-kun," Lenalee smiles. "But maybe you should have thought about your fiancé before you–"

A gentle laugh of wind chimes dipped in ice. "MORON!"

Should he think back to this moment in time, Tyki would have registered a gloved hand, with a chain of poker chip and cards around the wrist. And it got bigger. Fast.

And then darkness.

(:~:)

Tyki shifts in his slumber, far too warm and comfortable to throw off the covers of unconsciousness. Gentle music plays with his hair, stroking the curls and singing softly in his ear. Slowly, following the variations like comforting strings, Tyki is led into the blurred area between sleep and wakening, as variable a boundary as wind and calm, eddies of warm and cold. Yet the music lulls him ever closer, both a lullaby and a call for him to wake, paradoxical in its whispering touch and its fierceness, dancing like a river breaking free of winter ice, flurries of snow that drift through layers of pine needles, only to be caught in an increasing gale that drifts nearly out of control.

As he rises out of layers of dream, chasing after this shining, unknown music that is both gentle and terrible in its alternating laughter and fury, sorrow and joy, Tyki opens his eyes, and understands. Evelyn paints poetry with her fingers, weaving an iridescent melody out of black and white keys. _I've chased my music just as I've chased her,_ he muses. _Evelyn is as glorious, powerful, beautiful and unimaginably perfect, just as this music is. She may have even surpassed it. _As the ballade, _Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G Minor_, Tyki realises, builds to its climax, he smiles and catches his breath as Evelyn brings down her fingers in a frighteningly fast sequence of notes, variation after variation that tugs at his heart and leaves him wondering when it should end, until the final chord sets his bones trembling with acknowledgement.

Evelyn halts over the keys, eyes narrowed in concentration, unimaginably tense, still wrapped up in music. But she straightens, surprised, when the sound of Tyki's claps reaches her from the sofa.

Tyki rises and strides over to her, glad they are alone. But when he slides next to her and hugs her tightly, it is with a different sense of emotion than before. And the first words that come from his lips are not what Evelyn expected. "Thank you."

"For what?" Evelyn chuckles into his shoulder.

"For being far more beautiful than my music could ever be," he whispers back.

A pause.

Evelyn lets out a long, slow breath. "Wow," she mutters, shifting in his embrace. "I didn't expect that sort of depth right at that moment."

He laughs lightly. "Did it surprise you?"

"Not really. You're quite something, Tyki." A kiss on his cheek.

"You're awesome," he murmurs truthfully.

Laughter like silver bells. "And just like that, lost your touch."

A few moments later: "I love you, Tyki."

"I know."

(:~:)

By the time dinner is over, Allen decides he's had enough. The Christmas-decorated cafeteria appears to be full of couples. Tyki and Evelyn are _decorous_ as ever, laughing as they fight over eggnog. Miranda and Marie are trying to be discreet, but failing epically, as Marie's booming laugh at whatever Miranda says attracts far more attention than he would wont. Lenalee attempts to remain unobtrusive. But given that her boyfriend is Lavi, perhaps she cannot be faulted for being unsuccessful. Cross throws back glass after glass of wine with his new girlfriend beside him. And _mistletoe_ hangs everywhere about the room.

_Ugh._

"OI! EVERYONE!"

Allen's yell jolts the majority of the room, who turn to survey the white haired boy sceptically. Komui wipes a chunk of cake off his face and raises an eyebrow. As Timcanpy settles in his hair, Allen flashes a wide grin, opens his arms as if hugging them all en masse, and shouts, "Charades!"

The roar of assent reaches him a moment later. Allen darts up onto a table, ignoring the protesting squeak of table legs, and begins to frolic about, saying in a ridiculous accent, "Guess who I am." He tips an imaginary hat at his audience, before suddenly dropping down, looking at his hands and _squealing,_ "Oh no! We've been duped! This boy's far more skilled at poker than I would have thought!"

"It's Tyki!" Lavi yells, well aware of the golden glare burrowing into the back of his head.

Allen continues to pirouette and prance about, exclaiming, "Why, I hear music!" He comes to a theatrical stop, whereupon he turns to Evelyn and sobs, "What a beautiful lady! I cannot stop your irresistible feminine qualities from touching my heart!" He trips forward and kneels on the table in front of Evelyn, proffering an imaginary ring. "If it were possible for you to lower yourself, marry me, for I am such an unworthy moron of gentlemanly descent!"

Evelyn shouts with laughter and reaches for Allen's hand. Allen grins, until one of Tyki's silver daggers embeds itself by his foot. At this, Allen wisely chooses to stop his act, much to the disappointment of the room in general.

The night goes on.

And then Reever is up next. He flings off his lab coat and slides about on the cake-covered table, straightening his waistcoat. For a moment, he grins carelessly at the expectant crowd, and then he sweeps down, grabs a spare mug from Johnny's hands, and waves it about, splashing coffee everywhere. "Nasty, nasty, NASTY!" he whines pathetically, stamping his boot on the table with an echoing _boom._ "I don't want this coffee!" With amazing dexterity, he leaps into the air and performs a mid-air split. "I want Lenalee's coffee!" Chaos ensues as he kicks dishes everywhere in his perfect landing.

"_HARHAR! Supervisor Komui!"_ the cries begin to grow.

But Reever is not done yet. "Kooooommmuurin five!" he positively _squeals,_ batting his eyelashes. "So beautiful! I'm going to protect it forever…"

Komui's bellow shocks him out of it. "SCIENCE DEPARTMENT HEAD REEVER WENHAM!"

Reever freezes as if struck. On reflection, perhaps he shouldn't have had so much to drink before this. "Ah, supervisor," he murmurs sheepishly.

Komui smiles a crocodile smile, his voice dropping an octave. "What say you come down, or I give you overtime for the rest of your life?"

Reever acquiesces reluctantly.

"Give us something abstract!" Tiedoll yells impatiently. He's quite enjoying this.

"I'll do it, Master Teddy!" Evelyn calls. There is a collective whoop as Tyki hands her up onto the table. With a smile, Evelyn pretends to write.

"Words!" someone shouts.

"Good guess, but not quite," she says. Her hands move over unseen keys.

"Music?" Reever queries. The overlapping exclamations of others drown him out.

Over the tumult, Tyki grins slowly, and says quietly, "Poetry."

Evelyn laughs into the quiet. "Right you are, Moron."

"What?" Allen frowns.

Tyki takes a breath, and then begins to speak. "Poetry is music of the pen, where poet and reader are composer and listener, speaker is conductor and words the orchestra. It shocks and it soothes in alternate waves, and never fully fades away – instead, poetry echoes in the mind as the last, lingering chords of music do, dancing in their song."

Silence.

"You've spent far too much time around her, mate," Lavi mutters, nudging Tyki. "You're even more eloquent than before."

When Evelyn leaps down lightly to join Tyki, Tiedoll raises his glass to them in the general laughter and wolf-whistling. "Given that you two have proven your love for each other time and again, why not give us some of your fabled music?"

Tyki shakes his head, but Evelyn shrugs and whispers in his ear. A moment later, Acumen has opened a portal to another room, and the two pianos, white and black, quickly pushed into position in the space at the front of the cafeteria. Tyki takes his place at the sable piano, while Evelyn sits opposite. "Shall we give them some Mozart?" Evelyn whispers, raising and eyebrow.

Even as the crowd laughs, Tyki and Evelyn begin without needing to look at each other, at precisely the same moment. _Mozart's Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major._

(:~:)

The music flows down the aisle between the tables, out the doorway and through the stone hallways of Headquarters, giving warmth to the flagstones. They give light to the snow falling gently outside. And they mask the soft sound of boots on grey stone, coming to a stop just outside the cafeteria.

Candlelight plays over straight blue hair, and the handle of a katana strapped to the shadow's back. Cut-off gloves half-frozen to the straps of a rucksack, lips spreading in a little-seen smile. The music draws to a close, and far off, a clock strikes twelve.

"Merry Christmas."

The two words lance through Evelyn's thoughts. As one, the entire room turn to the doorway.

"Congratulations," Kanda Yuu mutters, folding his arms and frowning.

Tyki, for once, isn't all that bothered by Evelyn's mad sprint over to Kanda and the ensuing tearful embrace.

"What are you doing here?" Tyki gets in a word between Allen and Lavi jostling to get at Kanda.

Kanda smirks, then says in a manner completely different than his usual sour tone, "Well, I'm best man. I had to be here in time for your wedding, didn't I?"

Evelyn laughs as Tyki smiles down at her.

(:~:)

THE END

Happy Christmas!

**Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope I've painted this in a well-enough light. And since I'm leaving Tyki and Evelyn here, I'm sure they'll live happily ever after. Reviews please? Watch out for any new fics of mine!**

**And to Jenna, the guest reviewer: This is the only way I can reply to your reviews if you don't have an account, so please accept my apologies. Thank you for your heartfelt reviews. Road lives for trickery, after all, so she wanted to observe what would happen to Tyki if his relationship with Evelyn continued to progress in secret from the rest of the Noah. I'm humbled by the fact you like my writing so much even though it's sort of juvenile here, so I can't be grateful enough.**

**See ya! - E.E.**


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